


Arkanis Is Mine

by Zippa6



Category: Star Wars, Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1980s Manchester, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff, M/M, No Major Character Death, POV Ben Solo, POV Hux, Post-Punk, Romance, Slow Burn, Softness, benarmie
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-04
Updated: 2019-06-18
Packaged: 2019-07-06 22:53:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 25
Words: 78,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15895791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zippa6/pseuds/Zippa6
Summary: Armitage Hux is determined to be a rock star someday. Only trouble is, he doesn't have a band. Then, one day, he meets a tall, dark-haired boy named Ben.Arkanis Is Mine is a Benarmie slowburn romance set in the post-punk scene of a rainy industrial city.For the Kyluxxoxo Fest 2018Week 9: Time/Mate/Poetry





	1. I - I'll Tell You the Story of My Life

**Author's Note:**

> In this fic, Arkanis is a fictionalized 1980 Manchester. I modeled Armitage on Morrissey and Ben on Johnny Marr, and Phasma somewhat on Linder Sterling, but with personalities of their own. Lots of allusions to songs by The Smiths!
> 
> The title is referencing the lyric “England is mine, it owes me a living” in the song [“Still Ill” by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/n4eYmtPFyvM).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brendol Hux forces a career “opportunity” at First Order Manufacturing on Armitage. Unexpectedly, this leads to Armitage meeting someone who may possibly change his life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CONTENT WARNING: Brendol Hux. So: implied abuse, homophobic slurs, sexist slurs.
> 
> The title of this chapter is from [“Half a Person” by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/hz0UADjaHKo)
> 
> You'll notice there are footnotes! Those are to explain the references to the Smiths songs. If you want to read them, they're [here](https://the-call-from-the-light.tumblr.com/post/178079718556/arkanis-is-mine-footnotes-chapter-1), but it’s totally not necessary. I am just a nerd.

### Chapter 1

####  _I'll Tell You the Story of My Life_

It was raining. Then again, it was almost always raining in Arkanis1 — not that the slight, slender boy standing in front of the window minded.

“Armitage Patrick Hux,” he said, proclaiming himself to the weather outside, “twenty-one, clumsy and shy2 — thin as a sheet of paper, and just as useless.”

He threw out his arms and took an exaggerated, dramatic bow.

But paper wasn’t useless, Armitage knew. That was what his father said, and his father didn’t know the value of paper — paper printed with words already written, blank paper with the promise of words yet to be written. The only paper his father cared about _was_ worthless: money — pound notes and cheques with an excess of zeroes.

There was a pounding on the door of his tiny bedroom, and Armitage quickly straightened. His straight, light copper hair flopped over his forehead as he turned toward the door.

“Oy, Armie!”

It was his younger sister, Cassandra. He cracked open the door and she was peering back, with the same green-flecked-with-gray-and-gold eyes as his, her nose crinkled, and her mouth twisted in annoyance.

“The General has seen fit to grace us with his presence this morning, just when it’s most inconvenient,” she said. “Get your arse downstairs before he bombs the moors or something.”

‘The General’ was Brendol Hux, their father — General Manager of First Order Manufacturing, the largest employer in Arkanis. Its factory was the source of the gray smoke that darkened the already-always-gloomy sky.

Armitage pushed back his hair, tucked in his shirt, and took off his glasses, which his father told him made him look like a “bloody swot.”

“Such is the lot of bastards, eh?” he said to Cassandra as he stepped out of his room. “Always to be at the beck and call of the whims of their illustrious sire.”

She nudged him hard on the shoulder as they jockeyed for space on the narrow staircase.

“Speak for yourself,” she said. “Call yourself a bastard, but I’m Miss Fitzhux, if you please.”

Armitage blew a raspberry and stomped down the stairs past her, his footsteps deadened by the rust-colored shag carpet. His mother, Bridget, looking wan and stressed in her suit skirt and blouse that she wore to her job in the basement offices of a government building, stood near the wall on the landing. She held her hands clutched in front of her, a faun-colored overcoat draped over her arm. Armitage bent down over her, kissing her cheek.

“Good morning, my lady mother,” he said, grinning.

“Go on with you,” Bridget said, good-naturedly giving her son a gentle chuck on the arm. “Greet your father. He has something for you.”

Brendol Hux seemed to materialize out of the sitting room, gliding into view. His hair, red like his children’s, was slicked back severely, and he wore a double-breasted suit that did little to hide the round paunch of his belly. Armitage felt the same instant, simultaneous loathing and anxiety to please that he always felt around his father.

“Hello, Father,” he said, his hands in his pockets.

Brendol glared until Armitage took his right hand out of his pocket and held it out. Then he took his son’s hand and gave it a firm shake.

“No improvement since the last time I was here, I see,” he said, looking over Armitage.

Over six feet tall but skinny and swaying as a calla lily, incorrigible red hair falling in his eyes, dressed in jeans and a Bowie T-shirt, Armitage Hux knew he was not the specimen of manliness that Brendol Hux wanted in a son. The word “queer” had been spat at him from his father’s lips more than a few times.

Armitage returned his father’s gaze, forcing himself not to look away. “I live to disappoint yet another day,” he said.

Brendol’s right arm twitched, as if he were about to raise it — to strike Armitage with the back of his hand as he’d done so many times before. But he merely hardened his gaze on his son until Armitage felt his father’s full contempt for him.

Cassandra made her way tentatively from the landing, ready to intervene. She fared better than Armitage, since she met Brendol’s expectations for a daughter — on the surface anyway. She was willowy and lovely, the fair complexion that was pale and almost unhealthy on Armitage creamy and blooming on her skin, the full pink lips that made his face appear sullen making her the picture of femininity. Besides, Cassandra was a master manipulator, and she appeared before her father with a green ribbon that matched her eyes holding back her strawberry blonde hair, dressed in her school uniform — the tie neatly knotted, her blouse crisp, her knee socks pristine. Out of her father’s sight, Cassandra smoked cigarettes behind the town hall with boys in leather jackets and got top marks in school even though she rarely attended class. But Brendol Hux didn’t know either of his children well enough to know what they did outside of the brief visits he made to the narrow red-brick terraced house. Brendol Hux didn’t exactly hide his illegitimate children; he just kept them someplace where he wouldn’t see them unless he wanted to.

Cassandra stepped between her father and brother. “Hello, Daddy,” she said, kissing him on the cheek.

Armitage held back a shudder. He couldn’t imagine kissing that ruddy, blotched face. Shaking Brendol’s hand disgusted him enough.

“Well, boy,” Brendol said. “Do you want to know what I have for you?”

 _Something useless, no doubt_ , Armitage thought.

“Yes, sir,” he said.

Brendol pulled an envelope from his breast pocket and held it out, looking like some kind of predatory Dickensian benefactor, Armitage thought as he took the envelope and opened it.

It was a letter, on First Order Manufacturing letterhead.

 _Dear Mr Hux:_ it read. _We are pleased to offer you an internship in technical writing at First Order Manufacturing._

“You’re giving me a job?” Armitage asked.

“Not a _job_ , an _internship_ ,” Brendol said. “Whether it becomes a job depends entirely on how seriously you take it.”

Armitage was silent, scanning the brief letter as if for a clue of how to answer.

“ _Well?_ ” Brendol pressed. “It’s not as if you’re doing anything _worthwhile_ since you left college and decided not to apply to university.”

“I’m writing music reviews,” Armitage said quietly, feeling that it was a mistake the moment he did, knowing that it was when Brendol turned on Bridget. It was what his father always did when he _really_ wanted to hurt his son.

“Look at this useless little cunt you birthed,” Brendol said with piercing, sadistic precision, each word level and perfectly enunciated in his acquired Received Pronunciation. “But of course I should have known what he’d be. Like births like. It’s a wonder Cassandra isn’t a bloody slut like you.”

Even as Armitage winced, he balled his hand into a fist. He kept his gaze fixed on the second button of his father’s suit jacket. _Punch him there, double him over, knee to the groin, elbow in the face_. 3

“Armie,” Bridget said in her lilting brogue that Brendol hated so much, “what do you say to your father?”

He swallowed hard and looked up at his mother, at his sister. Cass had her hand on their mother’s shoulder. She mouthed _Thank you, I’m sorry_ at him.

“Thank you, Father,” Armitage said, raising his eyes to look Brendol in the face. “I’m sorry for being ungrateful for the jo — for the opportunity.”

Brendol turned the corners of his mouth down farther. “Don’t disgrace me, boy,” he said.

Armitage nodded, looking back at the floor. “Yes, sir.”

Brendol _hmphed_ and then walked to the door, holding his hand out expectantly in Bridget’s direction.

“Aren’t you going to stay for breakfast?” she asked while handing him his overcoat.

“Breakfast here?” he said dismissively. “I’d sooner eat in the factory cafeteria.” He gave a last glance at Cassandra. “Learn from your mother’s mistakes,” he said to her. Bridget opened the front door for him.

He walked out into the gloom, turning up his collar as he waited for the chauffeur of the car at the curb to come over with an umbrella. And then he got in the car without looking back, and they drove away to the First Order offices in central Arkanis.

Cassandra and Armitage gave a shudder as the door closed and then looked at their mother. Bridget stood with her hand still on the doorknob, looking at the toes of her worn work shoes. Cassandra put her arm around her.

“Buck up, Mater,” she said, leading her mother away from the door and into their tiny kitchen. “We know you have to put up with him so we’re not all put out on the street. We don’t believe a thing that pompous bag of gas says. He’s a monster.”

Armitage put the kettle on and then spooned tea into the pot as Cassandra settled her mother at the kitchen table.

“You’re not really going to work in that dreadful place, are you, Armie?” Cass asked.

“If I don’t, he’ll take it out on Mum,” Armitage answered.

“Don’t do something you don’t want to do on my account, love,” Bridget said.

Armitage bent his slender frame, like a sapling in the wind, and kissed the top of his mother’s head. “I want to do anything that helps you, Mum.” He went back to the stove and poured the water into the teapot. “Drink your tea. Now, if you will excuse me, destiny is calling me on my typewriter.”

Cassandra rolled her eyes dramatically.

“I’m off to work in a quarter hour,” Bridget said. “Armie, eat something besides toast today.”

“I won’t!” Armitage promised as he made his way to the stairs.

* * *

The next Monday morning he got up at an ungodly hour to catch the bus, then spent a half-hour hunched in his seat over the composition book on his knees, scratching away with a stubby pencil in his cramped handwriting.

“What are you writing?” a melodious voice asked him.

Armitage started and then looked up and saw two earnest, black-lined blue eyes set in round face, a red mouth wearing a cheeky expression, a mane of blonde hair sticking out in unruly waves. She was leaning over the back of the seat in front of him, arms in a black leather jacket and hands with black-painted fingernails draped over it as she peered down at him.

“Words,” he said, then exaggeratedly studied the page of his notebook, said “Words,” pointed at a line, said, “words,” another line, “words.”

She rolled her eyes in a way that reminded him of Cass. “All right, Prince Hamlet, I’ll leave you to it then.”

And, abruptly, she turned and slid back down into her seat.

Armitage frowned, trying to think of something to say to show he appreciated her understanding his _Hamlet_ reference. But what was some girl with a posh accent, looking like she did, wearing what she was, doing talking to _him_?

 _Bollocks_. He took a deep breath and just came out with it. “My name is Armitage,” he said to her back.

She popped back up, smiling. “Well met, Armitage. I’m Phasma.”

“Phasma.”

She smiled, showing a set of small, sharp-looking teeth. “Not the name Mum and Daddy gave me, but a girl’s gotta make her own way in this big bad world. Phasma Sterling.”

“Sterling?” He frowned.

“You’re just going to repeat what I say to you, eh? Yes, _those_ Sterlings.”

“Your dad is my dad’s boss,” he said. “Hux. I’m Armitage Hux.”

“Well, well, well. Is that where you’re going, as well? Intern orientation day?”

“You got pulled into it, too?”

She changed her posture, tucking in her chin, squaring her shoulders. “‘ _It’s the family business, darling, and you have to learn something about it. You can’t just fritter away at your little drawings all your life_ ’.”

“You draw?”

“A bit. Graphic arts are more my thing.”

“What do you draw?”

She smiled again, close-lipped. “What do you write?”

He tipped his head slightly, side to side, then handed her his notebook.

She took it and began to read. “ _The sorry state of Arkunian culture was on full anemic display Friday night at the Cog and Wheel as The Holodrones couldn’t be said to have taken the stage so much as to have been swallowed up by it —_ ”

“Not out loud!” Armitage whispered, looking around the bus. “My contributions to AMW are _anonymous_.”

“Why? Are you hiding something? If that’s what you think, let it be known you think it.”

“Thank you for the life advice, girl I just met.”

Unexpectedly, she laughed, a rich, merry sound. “Don’t mind me. It’s the Sterling arrogance. Doing my best to cast it off.” She flipped the pages of his composition book, making the air blow into her face. “But I saw The Holodrones last Friday too. They weren’t _that_ bad. What’s the point of slagging them off?” She opened his notebook where her thumb landed. “Oh! Perhaps this is a clue! What have I found here? _Lyrics?_ ”

He snatched it back from her and she didn’t resist.

“So you’re insulting them because it makes you feel superior?” she asked.

“No,” he said evenly. “I’m insulting them because I _am_ superior.”

She raised her eyebrows. “What’s your band called, then?”

He didn’t bother to look abashed. “Don’t have one...yet.”

She laughed again, a hearty country manor kind of laugh.

“Why are you on the bus, anyway?” he asked. “I wouldn’t expect Daddy Sterling likes his daughter mingling with the hoi polloi.”

“Oh, he doesn’t like it,” she said, pulling a stick of gum from her jacket pocket and offering him one. He took it. “But I told him that if I’m going to do this bloody boring internship, I’m going to do it like everyone else does.”

“You are truly a champion of the common man — and _woman._ ”

“Oh do fuck off,” she said, but she smiled she said it, and Armitage gave a little sniff of laughter in response.

* * *

Phasma and Armitage kept to the back of the group as a bored woman from human resources led them around First Order Manufacturing’s factory, pointing out features of the operations. Wearing plastic safety goggles and earplugs, they mimed small talk at each other so extravagantly that they were dismissed from the tour early to start training in the office.

This training, suffice to say, was mind-numbing, and between their competent exercises in writing instruction manuals and drawing accompanying technical illustrations, they produced a series of “Impossible Machines” — the Poetry-Writing Engine and the Flower Assembler and the Music Mill, the Soul Extractor and the Self-Terminator and the Groupthink Gin.

The other interns avoided them; their fathers avoided them; and they were fine with that. They smoked on the roof during lunch breaks if it wasn’t raining, looking out over Empire Street. Four weeks into the six-week internship Armitage squinted through the rare sunlight at the record shop on the corner.

“Wait… who is _that_?”

Phasma sidled up to him, shading her eyes. “The ginger? Girl from St. Mary’s skiving off school, looks like. Too young for you, Armitage. Don’t be a letch.”

“ _Really_ , Phasma,” Armitage said, cringing. “The girl is my _sister_ , Cassandra.”

“Sorry.” She dug a pair of mirrored sunglasses out of the pocket of her wool overcoat and put them on. “You mean the boy with her? Tall one, dark hair?”

“There’s only one boy with her, so, yes.”

“Ah, so that’s your type, then.”

Armitage felt his cheeks burn, and he knew with absolute certainty that he was glowing like a beacon. “No. _No_. I don’t have a _type_. I’m just interested in knowing who is hanging out with my sister.”

“So ask your sister. I don’t know him. He looks older than her, though.”

Armitage peered down again. Cassandra was talking, gesturing wildly, and the boy was leaning against the brick wall, nodding, making a brief remark here and there. He _was_ tall, maybe even taller than Armitage, broad-shouldered. His hair, almost black, was a mass of tousled waves; he wore a black leather jacket and cuffed jeans. But he didn’t have the cocky affectation of most boys putting on the postwar delinquent look. Something about his posture and his gestures seemed _gentle_.

Phasma peered over his shoulder, turning to look him in the face.

“You’re licking your lips,” she said.

“They’re chapped,” he replied.

“Likely story. C’mon, break’s about over, and you don’t want Shankly4 having a go at us with his clacky dentures and horrible breath.”

“Right —” Armitage said, distracted. “I’m just going to — check on —”

Phasma rolled her eyes. “Right, check on your sister.”

Armitage trotted down the staircase, winding his way around a couple of other interns with a muttered “‘scuse me.” When he opened the glass door at the front of the building, he realized he had no plan. He just wanted to see this boy up close. He debated turning and going back in, but his feet just kept moving him forward, and a bracing wind even picked up at his back as if to propel him along.

 _Bollocks_. He was coming up right behind Cassandra. The boy shifted his gaze from her, looked right at him, and their eyes met. His were hooded, amber ringed in gold below heavy, earnest eyebrows that were slightly drawn together in an inquiring rather than hostile manner. Again: gentle. His mouth, though — seeing the full dark pink lips and the suggestion of a smile in the corners is what made Armitage’s knees momentarily wobble, his stomach drop, the skin on his hands tingle. Words, usually coming so fetchingly to his mind, failed him.

So he just slid up next to Cassandra, bumped his shoulder into hers, and hoped she’d take pity on him.

She did not.

“Bloody hell, Armie!” she shouted. “You want to give me a heart attack?”

“Aren’t you meant to be in school?” he asked, amazed that his voice worked.

She looked at him with disgust. “Sod off, loser. Since when do you care? Anyway, aren’t _you_ meant to be at work?”

“I’m taking a break.”

“Sure. Where’s that blonde you’ve been spending so much time with? Fanny? Fuzzy?”

“Phasma,” Armitage said, glancing nervously at the boy. “She’s just my friend.”

“Sure,” Cass said again.

They stood in awkward silence for a beat.

“Is... is this your brother, Cass?” the boy finally said.

“Unfortunately, this sodding busybody _is_. Drawn out into the daylight — which you can see from his pasty visage he doesn’t get much of — by the Machiavellian machinations of our dear pater.”

Armitage sighed inwardly. She was showing off, so she must like this boy.

She nodded her head toward the boy. “Armitage, this is Ben. Ben, Armitage.”

Armitage expected a nonchalant poking out of the chin as acknowledgment, but the boy straightened his posture — he was indeed taller than Armitage — and held out his hand.

“Good to meet you, Armitage. Cass is a smart girl, yeah? Bit of a brat, but smart.” His voice was deep, almost as if the words were coming from inside a cavern, resonating in his chest before reaching the outside air. And his accent was American. “I’m Ben.”

“Erm… yes,” Armitage stammered.

Ben’s hand around his was so _big_ — enveloping, soft, callused on the fingertips. _Gentle_ , just as he thought. Armitage held on a fraction of a second too long.

“Are you — do you go to school with Cass?”

“I go to a girls’ school, Armie,” Cass said.

“Yes, well… what I meant.... You can see how it would be easy for me to forget, seeing how infrequently you attend,” Armitage said, finally finding words again.

Ben laughed, his face lighting up in a goofy smile, his pink lips spread to show teeth that seemed almost mismatched, his eyes crinkling into half-moons.

Armitage was completely charmed.

“Yeah, he has you there, Cass. I’m out of school — got my O levels finished, still don’t know what to do with myself.”

“Ah, yes, same here.”

“I thought I saw you come out of the First Order building. Don’t you work there?”

 _He noticed me_ , Armitage thought.

“Just an internship our father lined up to me in hopes it would mold me into a company man.”

“And has it?”

Ben looked so serious, as if he truly cared about what Armitage was saying.

“No, that’s not what I’m meant for.”

“What is it you’re made for then?”

Cass cut in, ruining the moment. “You’re going to be a star, aren’t you, Armie?” She laughed. “A legend in his own time.”

Armitage felt the blush rising from his collar.

“We all have dreams like that, don’t we?” Ben said. “All of us worth knowing anyway.”

Armitage felt himself smiling but could think of not a single thing to say.

Ben looked down at the scuffed white toes of his Chuck Taylors. “I suppose you’re here to tell me I shouldn’t be encouraging truancy, huh?” he asked Armitage.

“Yes, Armie, why _are_ you here?” Cass asked.

“My sister doesn’t need any encouraging in the delinquency department, I know that. Can’t a brother say hello to his sister?”

Cass narrowed her green eyes. The sun had given her a smattering of freckles across her nose. “Not when the brother is _you_. Go on, get back to work. You want to lose your job?”

“It’s not a job, it’s an _internship_ , remember? Right, though, got to get back.” He rocked back and forth on his heels, smiling uncomfortably. “Well, goodbye. Good to meet you, Ben.”

 _Ben_ , he repeated under his breath as he trotted back across the street. He tried to ignore the hammering in his chest. _Stupid_. He didn’t get like this. Crushes were just a stop on the way to greater misery — and he was miserable enough already. 5

* * *

Cass was in a state, pleading with Bridget in the kitchen, when Armitage came home that evening.

“But _Mother_ , it’s _all-ages_ night, that’s what makes it all right for me to go!”

“Not all right with me. What kind of men are going to be there, knowing there’s unaccompanied young girls all about?”

“Oh, la, Mum, you sound so — so — so _Victorian_!”

Armitage tried go straight up the stairs without getting involved in the argument, but Cass’ uncanny hearing picked up the sound of the door softly closing.

“Armie!” she yelled. “Armie come in here and tell Mum that it’s all right for me to go to all-ages night at the New Republic!”

“Cassandra, your brother doesn’t decide what’s all right for you.”

Armitage hedged over and peeked through the kitchen door. Cassandra was standing with her hands on her hips, still in her school uniform, while Bridget sat at the small table with a cup of tea.

“Mum seems to think I need a _chaperone_ to go out. I told her I’d go with my friends, but that just isn’t — _hey_!” Her eyes lit up. “You could —”

“ _No_ ,” Armitage said. “I have better things to do tonight than hang about with a passel of teenagers.”

Cass rolled her eyes. “And what’s that, Grandad? Staying in with your slippers and paper? Bring your friend Phasma if you think you’ll get bored. You two can make fun of everyone like you always do. Mum, tell him you’ll let me go if he goes with me. _Please_ , Armie!”

“She can go if you go with her,” Bridget said.

“Cass, I have work to do. There’s the new album from Joy —”

“Ben will be there.”

His mouth stopped mid-word and it took a second for him to form a new one. “What?”

She gave him an arch, knowing look. “Ben will be there.” She took his hand in both of hers and shook his arm. “ _Please, please, please_ 6 my one, my only brother, won’t you do this for me?”

Armitage sighed, trying not to seem too eager. “All right.”

“Oh, thank you, Armie! You’re the best big brother in the world!”

“Don’t overdo it.”

“And _who knows_ , maybe you’ll get something out of it too, eh?” she said, smirking as she headed for the stairs.”

He ran after her, mock-swiping at her back. She shrieked and gave him a slap on the arm, and then rumbled up the stairs.


	2. II - Take Me Out Tonight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage and Ben form a connection, but is it really what it seems?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is from ["There Is a Light That Never Goes Out" by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/y9Gf-f_hWpU)

### Chapter 2

#### Take Me Out Tonight

Phasma was confused when Armitage told her why he was calling.

“All-ages night?” she asked. “What are you, sixteen?”

“No, but _Cass_ is. I’ve agreed to protect her honor, heaven knows why. You can’t leave me alone with her friends, Phasma. I’ll go mad and you’ll have to answer for the consequences.”

She sighed. “All right, Armitage, but you’re going to owe me. You get front row next time Shankly wants to dress us down.”

“Corrode my soul, why don’t you?”

“Bloody dramatic whinger,” she replied. “I’ll pick you both up.”

Armitage hesitated. Phasma lived with her family out in the same neighborhood as his father, in the greenbelt south of the city. Did he want her to see the plain brick terrace house, the shabby postage-stamp garden in front, the rusting wrought iron fence?

It began to rain again, spattering in great, plopping drops on the window.

Armitage sighed, and then gave Phasma their address.

She arrived driving a very unostentatious two-door, and Armitage was out the door before she could park and come up to the house. Phasma rolled down her window when she spotted him and waved. As Cass came outside, wearing a short black dress that didn’t suit her coloring and with her teased reddish-gold hair bound up in a filmy black headband, their mother’s voice quite clearly followed them.

“Be back by midnight, you hear me?”

“All _right_ , Mum!” Cass yelled.

“And Armitage, you’d better be _with_ her when she comes back!”

Armitage made a saluting gesture.

Bridget was standing in the doorway now, faded blonde hair tucked under a nylon scarf. Armitage saw the beauty under her weariness, what must have caught Brendol’s eye more than twenty years ago, when she was a new girl in the secretary pool, not much older than Armitage was now. With the rain as a screen, she looked like she could be their older sister. Up close, though he could see the worry lines on her face.

They piled into the car, Cass wedging herself in the backseat, Armitage folding his long limbs up to sit in front.

“Ta for the ride,” Cass said.

Armitage saw her studying Phasma as the light from the streetlights cast them in half-shadow that flickered as they moved. Phasma was wearing her leather jacket, with a newly-painted red stripe down the right sleeve; her blonde hair was platinum now, styled in a pompadour. Cass listened to Phasma and Armitage talk about music for a bit, discussing a band they’d seen the week before. Whatever she saw or heard, Cass decided she had a kindred spirit in Phasma, Armitage supposed, because suddenly she cut into their conversation.

“Do you know why our dear Armie agreed to take me out tonight, Phasma?”

“To chaperone you, he said.”

Cass scooted to the edge of the back seat and leaned forward. “Obviously a pretext,” she said in a mock-whisper. “There’s going to be _someone_ there he wants to see again.”

Armitage turned in his seat to glare at his sister. “Cass —”

“Really?” interrupted Phasma. She drummed her hands on the steering wheel. “Let me guess — tall, dark, leather jacket? Hangs about record shops in the middle of the day?”

Cass touched her index finger to her nose. “Did you see when Armie talked to him? His name is _Ben_ , and Armie is quite smitten already.”

“Cass,” Armitage hissed through clenched teeth, “if you do not shut it, I’m going to —“

“What?” said Cass. “Not take me? But then you won’t see him. Unless you two want to be seen at all-ages night _by yourselves_.”

Armitage turned his back on her once more and glared out the windscreen. The prickling on his neck was beginning again. He wasn’t even sure why he wanted to see Ben again — to what purpose? But he thought of the way Ben’s hair curled against collar of his jacket, the way he stood with one foot turned out on its side, the way he held his head, slightly forward, listening, with a kind of Joey Ramone unaffected awkwardness that his American accent only heightened. Armitage had to see him again, talk to him again, that was all there was to it. He didn’t even know what he wanted to say to Ben, or what he wanted Ben to say. He threw his head back against the headrest and sighed.

Phasma looked at him with a small smile. “That bad, eh?” she said. “I’ve got to see this Ben up close.”

“He’s dead cute,” Cass said, “and Armie’s _type_ , if you understand.”

Cass’ implication made Armitage’s heart jump and patter again, in a strange, syncopated rhythm. He wondered if he was about to die. Suddenly, he was newly concerned about what he was wearing, what he looked like. He’d started wearing his hair shorter since he got the internship, but it was as ginger and floppy as ever. He wore his horn-rimmed glasses, liking the way his green eyes looked through their lenses, large and clear, as if underwater. He wore his Bowie T-shirt with an old blazer. What if Ben didn’t like David Bowie? Could he like someone who didn’t like David Bowie? No, that didn’t bear thinking about just now.

Phasma parked the car across the street from the New Republic. The building was one of the red-faced, cheerless edifices that were all over Arkanis, grimy from the smoke. The black-painted steel door stood open, a not terribly pressed bouncer leaning on it as he looked over the kids filing in.

“I’m going to find my friends,” Cass said as they walked in. “Come near me _once_ all night and I’ll tell Mum you abandoned me.”

Phasma and Armitage went straight to the bar, poking their way through teenagers in the dim light. The barman, recognizing them, shook his head sadly as they approached.

“Sorry, mates, no booze tonight. Not even lager.”

They groaned and turned back to the room. A band was setting up on stage, so Armitage quickly started scanning the crowd. It wasn’t hard to to spot a shaggy head towering over everyone around him. Phasma nudged Armitage.

“Go on, then,” she said. “You can find me later.”

Armitage wove his way through the crowd, again without any plan of what he’d do or say once he reached Ben. He was drawn to him, as if on the end of a string that Ben was tugging toward himself, not even consciously, some kind of invisible influence he had just by virtue of being himself. Whoever _that_ was. _Mad_ , Armitage thought. _I know nothing about him_. He kept his eyes on the back of Ben’s head, watching the way it tilted this way and that. And then Ben twisted around, almost as if he _sensed_ , as if he _knew_ — no, that was mad too. But they met eyes over the tops of heads around them. Ben’s eyes crinkled as he smiled, and Armitage’s mouth went dry. He wished he’d at least gotten a soda at the bar.

Ben raised his hand in greeting, ducking his head down at the same time. He inched back through the crowd as Armitage began to move forward.

 _He’s… coming to me_ , he realized in half-terror, half amazement. _Let him come to you_ , he told himself with sudden clarity.

And then they were standing face-to-face, Armitage having to tip his head back slightly to meet Ben’s eyes.

“Hey,” Ben said. “Cass said you’d be here.”

“Yes, here I am. Erm… as you can see.”

What was it about this lanky boy that made him so damnably tongue-tied and awkward? Ben laughed softly, showing his teeth, and Armitage knew exactly what it was.

“C’mon, let’s sit at the bar,” Ben said, nudging Armitage with his shoulder.

“They’re not serving drinks tonight,” Armitage said.

“I know,” Ben said. “But we can get a soda and talk, right? Or is that too 1950s America? I’m American, I’m sure you’ve figured out, lived there until I was fourteen, when I came here to live with my uncle. Who is also American.” He grinned. “So sometimes I get social stuff here all wrong. But I’d like to talk to you. Is that OK? Too New York straightforward?”

Armitage felt as if he would simply collapse into a puddle. “No, no. That’s perfect.”

Phasma made herself scarce when she saw them coming over, not even giving him a secret smirk or raised eyebrow, to Armitage’s immense gratitude. His whole body seemed to quiver as they covered the short distance between the dance floor and the bar. The boy by his side loped, head bowed, but he never bumped into anyone. The crowd didn’t so much part for him as much as he seemed to anticipate each person’s movement and perfectly time and place his steps. Armitage felt carried along in his wake, keeping close by his side. Their hands brushed, and Armitage remembered the feel of Ben’s around his, the soft palm and callused fingertips.

The first band started playing as they sat down, so they put their mouths near the others’ ear as they talked. Ben’s breath on Armitage's neck, his hair brushing his cheek, his long fingers curled around the soda bottle, his big feet propped up pigeon-toed on the crossbar of the stool, the dark stubble on his chin and the corners of his mouth, those dark pink lips, slightly chapped, so close to Armitage’s skin. Was Ben noticing Armitage the same way? He wished he could read his mind, the way Ben seemed to be able to do with his — at least to know what he was going to say, finish his sentences, laugh at exactly the right time to make his spine turn to jelly. What were they even talking about? It didn’t seem to matter so much as that when they spoke, every word was specifically _for_ the other, and _no one_ else.

Armitage was describing the Self-Terminator machine that he and Phasma designed, entranced by the way it made Ben laugh. He threw his head back slightly and put his fingertips on the back of Armitage’s hand — just the briefest of contact, but enough to send electricity through his limbs.

 _He knows exactly what he’s doing_ , Armitage realized. _He wants me to like him as much as I want him to like me._

The second set was over before they realized it had started. Ben’s head popped up and he turned toward the stage.

“Shit!” he said. “I lost all track — I’m up next.”

“Up?”

“Cass didn’t tell you? That’s why I’m here on all-ages night. I’m playing.”

_Of course. The calluses on his fingertips._

Ben gave him a crooked smile. “Don’t go anywhere, yeah? I want to be able to find you after my set.”

Then he trotted off toward the stage, leaving Armitage trying not to gape after him. The woman hosting came onto state and introduced the next performer simply as “Solo.”

Ben had the same easy, awkward charm on stage as face-to-face. He sat on a tall stool, holding an acoustic guitar, his legs so long that his toes brushed the floor of the stage. He gave his guitar a nervous strum, checked its tuning. Then he took a deep breath in and finally spoke.

“I’m going to play some cover songs tonight,” he said. His deep voice sounded almost shy in the microphone, a bit uncomfortable, self-conscious — and yet somehow so utterly affecting. The sound of it descended on the crowd and the chattering instantly went silent. “The first one is just something I was messing around with, but I decided just now that I’ll play it becauses there’s someone here who I hope will like it.”

He strummed a chord, and then began. Armitage recognized it instantly and so did a few kids in the crowd, who jumped and clapped in excitement.

It was “Five Years” — by David Bowie.

 _For me?_ Armitage thought. _No, that’s — but — did he notice?_

He looked down at his shirt, and there was David Bowie, quite clearly showing under his jacket — his unmistakable Aladdin Sane visage. Somehow, Ben saw him look and then caught his eye, smiling. A few heads turned toward Armitage and he blushed furiously.

Ben sung the song slow and strong and earnest, his big hand around the neck of the guitar almost delicate as it formed each chord. Armitage found himself wishing he could see the muscles in his forearm flex as he strummed. The crowd joined in at the chorus, but Ben’s deep voice hung over all of theirs, and the song’s tragedy — the earth having five years left before it was destroyed — was heartrendingly tragic in a way it had never been to Armitage before.

If there were only five years left for earth, he thought, that would be only five years he’d have to know this miraculous boy he’d just met.

Ben played three more songs — first “The Passenger” by Iggy Pop and “All Tomorrow’s Parties” by The Velvet Underground, which he sang in a breathy voice that made girls exchange ecstatic expressions; the last song he said was his own. Armitage listened attentively to this one. It had a sound all Ben’s own — a jangling in the guitar strumming and a lilting to the melody that was vaguely folk-like, but Ben’s vocals were almost a growl. The words were dark, disjointed — like Ian Curtis’ words on Joy Division songs, the ones that filled Armitage with an unaccountably sweet sense of dread.

“ _And the force that surrounds us, runs through us, is the force that binds me to you_ ,” Ben sung, and Armitage wondered what he meant, _whom_ he meant. He had the feeling it was no one in particular, but he had a certain longing — for that person to be him. Perhaps.

After his set, Ben strode over to Armitage at the bar, and without a word took his hand, and there was that tug again, pulling him along. He stood and let Ben lead him out the door into the cold, wet night. Ben turned back once to meet his eyes, smiling that smile that seemed just for him.

It had stopped raining by some miracle, but Ben found an awning over an abandoned storefront, and they stood under it. He let go of Armitage’s hand but stayed standing near him, so that the mist of their breath in the cold mingled in the air.

“What did you think?” Ben asked earnestly. “Did you like it?”

“‘Five Years’ was… eye-opening. You made me feel the song the way I think Bowie meant for people to feel it.”

Ben ducked his head down, smiling, in that way Armitage already thought of as one of his identifying motions.

“But the other song — my song. How did that make you feel?”

He was standing so agonizingly close that in the cold, Armitage could feel the heat from his skin. And he could imagine the feeling of Ben’s hips against his own, his breath on his neck again. No, not _imagine_ — he actually _was_ feeling it, even though Ben wasn’t touching him. How was that possible? It wasn’t. More madness. Everything about being near this boy was mad.

“Like —” Armitage began. But could he say it? It was too much to say to someone he just met. “I felt like —” And then an insight flooded his brain, as if it wasn't his own thought but something placed there. “Like you were showing us a tiny sliver of a truth only you understand.”

Ben’s red lips turned up slightly in the corners and his eyes, fixed on Armitage’s widened slightly, the streetlights catching the amber. Armitage forced himself not to look away.

“I wouldn’t have known how to put it like that,” Ben said, “but it’s exactly what I wanted it to feel like.”

“What is it, then?” Armitage asked. “The bigger truth?”

Ben dropped his head, and then looked up at Armitage through his spare, dark lashes.

“If I knew how to explain it to you, I would,” he said. “Maybe _only_ to you.” He looked up again. “Is that weird? I’m sorry, I know sometimes I just say what I’m thinking and it’s too much —”

“It is strange,” Armitage said, “but perfectly so. People talk around what they mean so much, being coy, and then nothing _happens_. One wonders what could be if everyone just said what was on their minds.”

“I knew you’d understand,” Ben said. He let his fingertips brush Armitage's again. “I’d say I don’t know how I knew, but that’d be a lie — I have a sense for these things.”

A tremble brought Armitage’s hand closer to Ben’s, and Ben caught hold of his pinky before he could move away again.

“A sense?”

Ben threw his head back, as if searching the sky for how to answer. “Of what people are feeling, their thoughts sometimes. The clearer it is, the more I know that I’ve found someone who will understand me.” He lowered his head, and his pupils widened as he refocused his gaze on Armitage’s face. “And your feelings are so clear to me. It’s like I don’t even have to talk for you to understand.” He laughed softly. “Probably better if I didn’t talk, yeah? I know I sound crazy.”

“No,” Armitage said. “I’ve been thinking this is all mad, too, but — it explains what I… It explains things.”

Ben grinned fully again. “Ah, there you are — holding back. Not saying what’s really on your mind, I can tell. You don’t have to, though, don’t worry. But you have such a way with words, it would be nice to hear. Not like me and my babbling.”

“A way with….” Armitage struggled to maintain hold on his thoughts as Ben gave his hand a little shake, his fingers still wrapped around Armitage’s pinky. “How would you know what sort of way I have with words? I’ve been pressed to put two sentences together since I met you.”

“Have you? I suppose it’s just that I know what you _want_ to say. And because of your writing.”

Armitage’s lips went suddenly cold. “My writing?”

“Yeah, in AMW. Your music reviews. Cass showed them to me.”

Armitage licked his lips. “You’ve read my articles?” he asked, unnecessarily.

Ben bobbed his head enthusiastically. “You’re so _honest_. No bullshitting around, you know?” And he started _swinging_ his hand that was holding Armitage’s, like a kid on a playground. “Are you gonna write something about tonight’s show?”

Armitage frowned. “No. It wasn’t assigned. I just came here to see — because Cass — because she —”

“That’s too bad,” Ben said. “Maybe they’ll let you anyway. That would be amazing — seeing what you said to me just now in print —”

A sudden rush of indignation washed over Armitage. He pulled his hand away from Ben’s. “I told you that _only_ for you — just like you were saying you’d tell me what your song meant. But that was an act, wasn’t it?”

Ben’s dark eyebrows drew together in concern. “An act? No, I really —”

Armitage took a step back. “All of this — those ingenue eyes of yours, the mind-reading nonsense, trying to make me feel _special_ — all an act. And for what? To get you a few lines in _Arkanis Music World_?” His voice was low and even, the way he always wished it could be when he spoke to his father, telling him exactly what he thought. “You sell yourself cheap,” he said, and then spun and strode back to the club.

“Armitage, wait!” Ben called after him. “I didn’t —”

But then Armitage was inside the club and couldn’t hear him over the music and chatter. Phasma was at the bar again, head tipped conspiratorially with the barman’s as she shared her flask with him.

“I have to go,” Armitage said to her, his voice startlingly loud in the din. He was shaking, he realized — with too many emotions to sort out as he stood there.

Phasma looked at him questioningly. “What happened?”

“ _Not now_. I just need to _leave_.”

Ben ran up behind him just then. “Armitage, I’m sorry — you have it all wrong. That’s not what I —”

“Excuse me, I have to find my sister,” Armitage said, stepping around him. He turned back. “And you better not talk to _her_ again, either.”

Armitage found Cass in a group of girls near the stage and put his hand on her shoulder. She turned.

“What do you want, you lump?” she said, annoyed.

“It’s time to go.”

“Go?! It’s not even eleven —”

But she must have recognized the desperation in Armitage’s face, because she left off and quietly said goodbye to the other girls. She led Armitage out, holding up his tall frame as his shaking turned into a despondent limpness.

The three of them didn’t speak as they passed by Ben, who stood helplessly trying to speak to Armitage. They went out into the chill of the Arkanis night, where it had begun to rain — only lightly, so that the world, cruelly to Armitage, seemed to sparkle under the streetlights.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I debated whether Ben's stage name should be Kylo Ren, but I decided against it because I wanted to write a version of Ben Solo who is entirely free of Snoke's influence. I imagine he'd still have a dark streak, a way of using the ability to influence in a way that is self-serving and guileless at the same time. Armitage -- well, he's not so lucky as to have escaped Brendol Hux's influence, and he still has that fragile ego.


	3. III - A Dreaded Sunny Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage learns more about Ben, and then Phasma and Cass try to get his mind off Ben -- and fail.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is from ["Cemetery Gates" by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/2kdc6XhT9Bk)

### Chapter 3

#### A Dreaded Sunny Day

Armitage sat down heavily in the passenger seat, leaned back into the headrest, and pressed the heels of his palms to his closed eyes. His shaking had given way to a kind of unnaturally still rage. Not at Ben — but at himself. For being such an unforgivable fool. For believing, even questioningly, that Ben could have been interested in him for himself, could have felt a true connection with him. For wishing it had been real.

Phasma started the car and pulled away from the curb, glancing worriedly at Armitage but saying nothing. The drove in silence for a few minutes.

“Armie?” Cass said softly from the backseat. “What happened? Are you OK?” She leaned forward, her hand on her brother’s shoulder.

He threw his hands off his eyes. “Yeah,” he said, his voice sounding huskier than he wanted. “Yes. Just — Cass, you told him I write for AMW?”

She sank back down in the seat. “Yes. I’m sorry.”

“Did you tell him _before_ or _after_ I met him?”

“After,” she said. “No, wait — before. I told him before you met that you wrote for them, but I didn’t show him your article from the latest issue after. I know you want to stay anonymous, but he was so interested, Armie, and I thought I was helping —”

“Helping whom? _Him_? Or _me_? Or _you_?”

“You!” Cass cried. “Well, _me_ , at first. I just wanted to impress him. But then after you two met, I thought — I know you want to perform, and you need a band, so….”

Armitage groaned. “Cass, I don’t need help from my little sister to form a band! Meddling in my life like this — you’re as bad as… as… the _General_.”

Cass let out a short whimper. “Armie, that’s not fair.”

“Armitage, Cass meant well,” Phasma said. “Don’t take Ben Solo being a cunt out on her.”

Armitage put his hands back up to his face, rubbing up and down. “Ugh, I know. You’re right. I’m sorry, Cass.” He sighs. “Wait, Solo is his _surname_? How did you find that out?”

“Bartender,” Phasma said. “I found out more, too.”

“Do I want to know?” Armitage asked.

“You might.”

“Armie,” Cass said, “I know how you are. If he’s such an arsehole, let it go. Phasma, trust me, he’ll obsess over it.”

Phasma pulled the car up to their house. They thanked her for the ride and got out. Armitage took two steps toward their front door, stopped.

“Armie,” Cass said. “Don’t.”

But he turned and went back to Phasma’s car and tapped on the window. She looked up, her blue eyes blurry through the wet glass. He motioned for her to come in with them.

“You’re going to regret it,” Cass said.

“I’m really not,” he replied.

She shook her head and unlocked the front door. The three of them went straight upstairs, and Bridget peeked out of her room when they were on the landing.

“You lot are home earlier than I — oh!” She broke off when she saw Phasma. “Hello.”

“Mum, this is Phasma — from work,” Armitage mumbled.

Bridget couldn’t seem to muster words for a moment. “Well, aren’t you a tall girl!” she finally said. “Armie has talked about you. Call me Bridget.”

Phasma held out her hand. She was putting on her poshest manners, even if unintentionally. Armitage winced inwardly.  

“So pleased to meet you, Bridget,” Phasma said. “You’re a wonderous woman for raising people like Armitage and Cassandra.”

“Oh, well, ta very much. I’m proud of them,” Bridget said, flustered. “Well… I’ll leave you to… ah, well — good night.”

She closed her bedroom door, and Cass giggled.

“She’s gotten the wrong end of the stick,” she whispered. “Her little boy, growing up, bringing home girls!”

“Quiet,” Armitage said through his teeth.

“Just tooling with you, Armie.” She stood on her toes to peck his cheek. “I won’t meddle again. Unless whoever you set your cap at next doesn’t deserve you. I’ll be your worst nightmare then. G’night, you two!”

She sailed into her room, giggling again.

Armitage opened the door to his tiny room and Phasma inched around him on the narrow landing to go inside. She sat on his bed and threw off her leather jacket. Under it, she was wearing a black-and-white striped boatneck shirt that made Armitage think of The Ramones, who made him think about Ben. He stood at the window, hands in pockets, gazing out.

Phasma leaned back, propped up by her hands on the bed. “So are you going to tell me what happened?”

Armitage flopped down on the chair at his desk. “I’m such a pillock. He just wanted exposure in AMW.”

Phasma considered this for a moment. “Are you sure? His ‘earnest boy crushing hard and openly on Armitage Hux’ thing didn’t seem fake to me.”

Armitage leaned back and let his head flop. “Trust me, it was. The… the — _nonsense_ he told me, Phasma. Twaddle about reading minds and — it’s all too stupid to recount.”

“See, that’s where what the barman told me comes in,” Phasma said, leaning forward toward Armitage, her elbows on her knees. “Ben Solo is the nephew of that guru, Luke Skywalker.”

Armitage frowned. “I don’t know who that is.”

“Well, you know all that hippie nonsense in America back in the ‘60s — Ben’s uncle was mixed up with that and he got involved with some kind of cult. I don’t know what their deal was entirely — astroprojection or something. Changed his name to Skywalker, moved here because he was ‘called,’ started taking in stray kids, runaways, teaching them.”

“That certainly is… eccentric,” Armitage said. “But what does it have to do with Ben?”

“Well, it explains the strange stuff he told you about mind-reading or whatever it was. It’s his uncle’s influence.”

“That doesn’t mean he wasn’t trying to use me — and Cass. Forget him, Phas — he’s a bloody… he’s nothing.”

“OK,” Phasma said, “but you don’t mean that.”

“I _do_. I really do.” He pushed his hair out of his face. “It’s just that — I don’t know, I feel so stupid. Like some sad sop so desperate to be liked that I’ll believe any bloody thing. That I’ll let some 18-year-old pretty boy get to me like that.”

He realized with a rush of shame that he was _crying_. Crying over what? Some American boy he’d known for eight hours? Or something else — the certainty that he would live the rest of his life, however short or long that would be, alone, unloved, unloveable.

“Oh,” said Phasma. “Oh, you great sodding idiot, don’t do that.”

She stood and came over to kneel in front of him and wrap her arms around his narrow shoulders. He stiffened and then let himself sag into her.

After a moment, Phasma pulled away. “If you got snot in my hair, I’ll ruin you,” she said. She put her hands around his forearms and squeezed, her earnest blue eyes fixed on his face. “Come on, then. Don’t be hard on yourself. I’ve had it worse over boys half as pretty. You need a rest and a cuddle. Get that puny body on your bed.”

Armitage sighed but obeyed, curling up on his side on his narrow bed, facing the wall. Phasma lay down spooned up next to him, arm across his waist, nose against his shoulder, her breath warming his skin through his T-shirt.

“I hate to admit this,” Armitage said, “but this is actually slightly comforting. You’re like a great big hot water bottle.”

“Ssshh. It’s not sexy if you talk.”

Armitage elbowed her in the side gently, and then settled his head into his pillow. “Thank you,” he murmured.

* * *

Cassandra came into his room the next morning and pounced on Armitage. He woke swiping her into a headlock, and their wrestling nearly tumbled Phasma off the bed.

“Oy, she-devil!” Armitage cried. “Why are you up as arse-o’clock on a Saturday?”

“It’s 10, you great layabout. And it’s a lovely day. Sunny, not a bit of rain in the forecast.”

Armitage groaned and sat up. Phasma, still resolutely asleep despite the tumult, turned over and threw her arm over her face.

“It sounds dreadful,” Armitage said.

Cassandra stood and tugged his hand until he stood up.

“I made us a proper picnic, with little sandwiches and all, and you’re going to come with me and enjoy it.”

“Why are you being _nice_ to me?”

“You make everyone miserable when you’re miserable. This is pure self-preservation.” Cass looked at Phasma. “Is she just going to sleep?”

“I’ll wake her up. We’ll be down in a few minutes.”

“Be prepared for our dear mater to wonder if she ought to say something about Phasma staying the night. She’s down there consulting tea leaves right now.”

Armitage groaned again.

Phasma woke when Cass slammed the door shut. She sat up and rubbed her face, smearing the remains of her eye makeup across her face.

“Oh, fuck me. I stayed all night?”

Armitage flopped back down on the bed, slouching against the wall. “You did.”

“Point me loo-wards.”

“Out the door, first door to the left.”

“Right then.”

Armitage changed his clothes, which smelled of rain and fog and, _somehow_ , of a warm, sweet scent that he knew was Ben, heaven knows how. He balled up the Bowie shirt and the rest of his clothes and shoved them in the hamper, then put on a worn black button-up and a pair of black jeans.

Phasma came back in with her face scrubbed clean and her hair slicked down. She glanced at him, looked over his clothes, said, “What, are you in mourning?” and then went to his wardrobe and rifled through the clothes. Armitage averted his eyes as she turned her back to him, peeled off the striped boatneck, and replaced it with his New York Dolls T-shirt.

“You don’t have be so prissy now that we’ve slept together and all,” she said, nudging him before getting on the floor to find her boots under his bed.

“Do you want to come to this picnic Cass planned?”

Phasma stood, holding her boots in her hand, and smiled. “Are you fucking kidding me? I wouldn’t miss it. It’ll be like tagging along for tea with leprechauns.”

“Our preferred nomenclature is _fey folk_ ,” Armitage said. “And stay bloody well away from our Lucky Charms.”

* * *

They managed to sneak out of the house without Bridget making up her mind to speak to Armitage first. Cass led the expedition, giving Phasma driving directions but refusing to tell them where they were going until they were at the stone and wrought iron gates of New Hope Cemetery.

“A picnic in a graveyard,” Phasma said as they walked down the gravel path, looking for a place to lay out their blanket. “I like the way you Fitzhuxes think.”

Armitage walked behind the two girls with his hands in his pockets, looking at the ground. Cass held back so she could walk next to him, bumping his arm with her shoulder.

“Come on, Arm — look around. Put things in perspective.”

“What perspective? That all these people were probably just as miserable as me and now they’re dead?”

“Oh, you absolute bore! I don’t even know why I try to be nice to you.”

Cass trotted back up to Phasma, who was standing in a grassy area under a tree.

“Not even muddy!” Phasma said. She looked at the nearby gravestones, dull gray stone with moss growing on the edges. “And I think Robert Anthony Wilson, died June 23, 1897, ‘Death Shall Not Part Us,’ will be happy for the company.”

Cass spread out the blanket and opened the picnic basket. There were indeed tiny sandwiches, and apples, and a thermos of tea, and some kind of sunken-in cake that she’d made.

“When did you have time to do all this?” Armitage asked. “Didn’t you sleep?

Cass shrugged. “My desire to take care of my soppy big brother manifested as an irresistible domestic urge.”

“Do you listen to the rot you talk?” Armitage lay down on the blanket, looking up at the blue sky full of puffy white clouds.

They ate, and Armitage, listening to Cass and Phasma talk about books and art and school, forgot for a time that he was supposed to be wretched over a dark-haired, long-limbed, big-handed boy named Ben Solo.

He didn’t forget _about_ Ben, though, and when Cass took out a book of Oscar Wilde’s poetry to read aloud from, he inwardly moaned in agony.

 _“Sweet, there is nothing left to say_ ,” read Cass,

“ _But this, that love is never lost,_  
_Keen winter stabs the heart of May_  
_Whose crimson roses burst his frost,_  
_Ships tempest-tossed_  
_Will find a harbor in some bay,_  
_And so we may._  
_And there is nothing left to do_  
_But to kiss once again and part,_  
_Nay, there is nothing we should rue,_  
_I have my beauty, — and you your Art._  
_Nay, do not start,_  
_One world was not enough for two  
Like me and you._ ”

Cass lay down on the blanket as well with a sigh. “Wilde’s diction can be so artificial in his poetry,” she said, “but when he lets himself be natural, he’s absolutely delicious.”

“But do you think with Wilde the pose is what was natural to him?” Phasma said. “Some people don’t find themselves until they make a decision to consciously construct who they are.”

“Like you and your name?” Cass asked.

Phasma laughed her hearty laugh. “Yes, like me and my name.”

“What a conundrum it would be if I liked Wilde better when wasn’t truly Wilde!” Cass said. “But if the pose is what is natural, and this seems natural — then this must be both. ‘Art is at once surface and symbol,’ like he said.”

“All very well and good,” Armitage said, “but you might consider how the subject matter of the poetry you read aloud may align with my general mood — if your goal is to cheer me up, that is.”

“Sometimes it feels better to feel worse,” Cass replied.

“It’s a good thing you never go to school, Cass,” Armitage observed drily, “or all that wisdom would be taught right out of you.”

Cass stuck her tongue out at him.

Phasma, sitting cross-legged, squinted and peered into the distance. “What’s that going on over there?”

Cass sat up and leaned forward. “What are they — is that —”  She broke off suddenly. “Oh, never mind, it’s nothing.”

“No,” Phasma said, “there’s definitely something weird —”

“It’s _nothing_ , Phasma,” Cass said insistently.

“But —”

“Am I going to have to referee this disagreement?” Armitage asked, still lying on the blanket, his arms folded on his slender chest.

“ _No_ ,” Cass said. “It was just some birds or something.”

“ _Birds?_ Cass, what are you talking about — those are clearly — _hey_! What the hell? Armitage, your sister just _elbowed me_ in the ribs, and she — oh! Oh, yeah, that _is_ nothing. Never mind.”

Armitage sat up now. “What is wrong with you two?”

In New Hope Cemetery the graves were tightly clustered around the winding paths, larger crypts and monuments rising over them. It was difficult to see anything through them, but Armitage caught a bit of movement in the distance. A couple of people, it looked like, doing some kind of… calisthenics? They were waving and windmilling their arms, stretching. And then, unmistakably — Ben. His seemingly off-balance but strangely graceful way of moving, his dark hair shining in the sunlight, his way of leaning forward as he listened to someone. Soon, the man that Ben stood facing moved out from behind a crypt. He had a grizzled beard and long hair and was dressed in baggy, homemade-looking clothes. He was much shorter than Ben, but Ben watched and listened to him with a respectful deference, nodding as the older man spoke, responding from time to time. The two then sat down on folding stools and picked up… guitars? The older man leaned forward and adjusted the way Ben’s fingers pressed on the fretboard, tucked in his elbow, squared his shoulders, raised his chin.

“Armie?” Cass said. “You OK?”

“I don’t believe this,” Phasma said. “This could only happen to you, Arm — you go to the graveyard for a peaceful picnic, and trouble follows you.”

“Is that his uncle?” Armitage asked. “Luke — what was it — Skywalker?”

“Must be,” Phasma said.

“He’s related to _that guy_? The weird American guru?” Cass asked.

“You know who he is, too?” Armitage asked.

“Some people pay attention to the world around them,” Phasma said.

“He’s Luke Skywalker’s nephew,” Cass said. “How did I not know that?”

“You were probably too busy making eyes at him to listen to anything he said,” Armitage said.

“You’re one to talk.”

Just then, Ben’s head popped up from his concentration on his guitar. It was like when he turned around when he was standing on the dance floor at New Republic, as if he _sensed_ he was being watched. Even after all that had happened last night, that same, mad impression stayed with Armitage — that Ben Solo had some kind of unaccountable connection with him, could feel his presence. Armitage tried to look away quickly and pretend like he hadn’t noticed Ben, but it was too late. Their eyes met. A blush spread across Ben’s cheeks as Armitage felt the flush rise on his. For a moment, he wondered which of them would look away first. Then, to his amazement — or disappointment? — Ben did, ducking down his head and returning his attention to his uncle.

“Did he see us?” Cass said in an unnecessary whisper.

“Yes,” Armitage said.

“Right then.”

She started to stand, but Armitage grabbed her hand and pulled her back down.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m going over there and asking what the hell he was thinking, being a complete tossing twat and wounding my _only_ brother.”

“ _No_ , you are not. I don’t want you to talk to him, Cass. And aren’t you the one who said _I_ shouldn’t obsess?”

Cass sat down and glowered in Ben’s direction. “Phasma, back me up here,” she said.

Phasma looked at Armitage. “No, Cass. Arm has this right. Just leave well enough alone.”

Not knowing what else to do, the three of them sat in the dappled sunlight under the tree and ate the almond cake Cass had made. It was flattish and the crumb didn’t hold together, but it was delicious.


	4. IV - Pretty Girls Make Graves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cassandra Hux is on a mission to make Ben Solo answer for his insult on her brother's honor. But it turns into another mission entirely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is from, well, ["Pretty Girls Make Graves" by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/r_Ql8HglIDE).
> 
> Moodboard for Cassandra!  
>    
> 

### Chapter 4

#### Pretty Girls Make Graves

Cassandra Victoria Hux was not the kind of girl to leave well enough alone. She seemed to breeze from place to place through the Arkanis streets after school — she’d started attending class regularly, god knows why — casually inquiring of boys she bummed cigarettes from if they’d seen Ben Solo lately; but really what she was doing was anything but breezing. She was a force with a stiff wind at her back, and she had a mission.

She finally spotted Ben three days after the cemetery picnic, in the rain as he came out of the grocer’s of all places. He was carrying a paper bag in one arm and his umbrella in the other hand. She crossed the street, her Wellies splashing on the the shiny-dark pavement, and fell in step beside him. Their umbrellas bumped, and he glanced at her nervously but kept walking, taking long, loping strides. Cassandra overtook him and then stood in his path, making him come to a sudden stop and clutch the bag against his chest. He was wearing a gray button-up with a Clash T-shirt on underneath, which made Cassandra inwardly roll her eyes and think, _American poser_.

“I’m here to make you answer for your slight against my brother’s honor,” she said, slightly tipping her umbrella at him.

Ben didn’t answer. He looked at her, and there was something in his expression, a sort of smoldering anger behind his amber eyes, that made her take a step backward. She was suddenly aware of his height, the width of his shoulders, the size of his hands — the way they gripped and crumpled the brown paper bag. The mild awkwardness of the boy she had met a week before was replaced with something darker. But it was something he was trying to overcome, it seemed. He breathed in deeply and closed his eyes for a second.

“Armitage told me not to talk to you, Cass,” he said, his deep voice quiet but firm, the anger in his eyes replaced with a kind of hardened resentment.

Cassandra mustered her resolve, standing up taller to try to reduce their size difference. “He doesn’t decide who gets to talk to me. _I_ do. And I want answers from you, Ben Solo. Armie was gutted. What did you do?”

He looked down and away from her and bit his bottom lip. _Jesus, Mary, and Joseph_ , Cassandra thought. _No wonder Armie went arse over elbows so fast._

“It was all a misunderstanding,” Ben said. “I was just thinking out loud, and he — he got so _defensive_. He thought I was using him, but I wasn’t. I….” He took a deep breath and swallowed hard. “I really do like him, Cass. I just got too enthusiastic, and my mouth got ahead of my brain. I forgot that just because I can tell what he’s feeling, he can’t do the same with me.”

Cassandra drew her eyebrows together. “And that’s another thing — you really got him all sideways with all your mind-reading talk.” She put one hand on her hip. “And how exactly did you _happen_ to be in the cemetery at the same time we were?”

Ben shrugged. “I dunno. When my uncle asked where I felt like practicing that day — he says different settings help you improve your focus —  something made me say New Hope Cemetery.”

“ _Something._ ”

“I can’t explain it, Cass. It’s why I came to live here with my uncle, you know.” He adjusted his hold on the grocery bag, loosening his grip, and pressed his lips together. “It did the same thing to my parents as it did to Armitage — just weirded them out, so they sent me away.”

Cassandra lowered her hand from her hip, almost wanting to reach out and pat him, as if he were a puppy. Instead, she thrust it into her jacket pocket.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “But, still — that has nothing to do with Armie.”

He sighed impatiently, miserably. “What am I gonna do, Cass? He doesn’t want me to talk to him, so how can I explain?” He turned his right foot, clad in a black boot, on its side, wobbled it back and forth. “And even then he wouldn’t believe me.”

Cassandra looked at him in pity as the the rain pattered against their umbrellas, the only sound between them for a moment. She had told Armitage that she wouldn’t interfere, and she had meant it then — but looking at Ben now — his earnest, pained eyes, his tall frame tense with frustration — she couldn’t help but be sympathetic. And convinced that this boy truly did like her brother. Her brother who was a right pain in the arse, but who meant well and wanted so much from life.

Ben’s strange ideas about sensing Armitage’s feelings, about being guided to be somewhere where he was — that was all part of that feeling when you have it bad for someone, right? Cassandra had never been in love, but it’s how she imagined it was. She clenched her hands and then released them.

“Look, if I help you, you can’t let Armie know,” she said.

His eyes registered surprise. “You’re going to _help_ me? How?”

Cassandra twisted her mouth. “Simmer down, keen boy,” she said. “I only just decided to do it. I haven’t time to figure out _how_ yet.”

Ben’s cheeks pinked. “OK. Then how — how will we —”

“I’ll find you,” she said. “In the meantime, lie low. None of this _following your feelings_ rubbish, all right? If Armie thinks you’re following him around l — well, honestly, knowing him, he’d probably secretly enjoy the intrigue aspect of it, even though it would scare him off, too. It’s the kind of thing he writes songs about.”

Ben’s expression lit up. “Armitage writes songs?”

“Hm? Yes, I told you — he wants to be a star. But —”

“Does he play them anywhere? Or has he recorded them? Does he —”

“Mary and Joseph, Ben!” Cassandra exclaimed. “Focus! How you can be this far gone over my brother already, I can’t fathom. _Anyway_ , best to keep a distance, all right? He’s skittish.”

Ben grinned. “You make him sound like a colt.”

“A what?”

“You know, like a horse — a young one that isn’t broken in yet, doesn’t want a bridle on it.”

Cassandra held in a laugh. “La, you really do say whatever comes into your head, don’t you?” She hoisted her school satchel higher on her shoulder. “Right. It’s going start pissing down soon. I need to catch the bus. Remember what I said.”

Cassandra rather liked that last sentence, she thought as she trotted back across the street. It was something a spy might say to an informant after a clandestine —

She heard ploshing footsteps behind her. Ben was following her.

“Oy, what are you doing?” she said, turning.

He bit his lip. “Uh, it’s just that —”

“ _What?_ ”

“I take the same bus.”

Cassandra sighed and they walked together to the stop.

“I’ve been trying to avoid you, you know,” Ben said as they closed their umbrellas and boarded the bus. “But then Uncle Luke sent me out to get this weird milk — goat milk? And that’s the closest shop that has it. So you see?”

She sat down. Nothing worse than a damp bus seat, she thought. The air inside was heavy, humid, too warm after being in the chilly rain.

“See what?” she said.

Ben set down the sodden grocery bag and sat across the aisle from her, his feet tucked under the seat, knees pointed down and toward her. He folded his hands and rested them on his thigh.

“Even if I try to avoid something, the universe has a way of making it happen if it’s supposed to happen,” he said.

Cassandra quickly averted her eyes from his hands back up at his face, but that was no good either. Here was, really and truly, a boy seemed made to twine his way around her ridiculous brother’s heart. But he could probably break it just as easily, even if he didn’t mean to. He was like an overgrown puppy with big paws that knocked people down and a wagging tail that knocked things off the coffee table.

“So, what, all this is your destiny or something? Meeting me, meeting Arm, then… what?”

He shrugged and rain that had fallen on his hair dripped down his neck into the collar of his shirt.

“I can’t predict the future, only sense the present.”

Cassandra sat back into her seat with a sigh. “Well, whatever force of destiny it was that made you go to the cemetery and your uncle need goat milk should have made you keep your silly trap bloody shut when you asked Armie to write about you.”

He looked struck for a moment and then laughed, a little huff in his throat as he tucked in his chin in and scrunched up his whole face.

“If only it kept me from screwing up,” he said. “But then I wouldn’t be in Arkanis at all, and I wouldn’t have met you, and then I wouldn’t have met Armitage, so maybe I _have_ to screw up for things to work out.”

“They still _haven’t_ worked out,” Cassandra said, looking at him curiously.

He nodded slowly and rubbed his palms against his thighs. “They will.”

His belief was something Cassandra had never seen in anyone before, not even at church, where everyone just seemed to be going through the motions of the Mass without ever penetrating into the invisible realm that Ben was so sure of. She studied his profile, the long prominent nose and the pouting lips, the dark, damp hair hanging over the angular shape of his brow. Armitage had probably studied him like this, when they were talking that night at New Republic. She had seen them, speaking as if sharing secrets, sitting so close each other at the bar. And she had been happy for her brother, so happy. Now — she almost felt the pain of betrayal and loneliness along with him, even if he was wrong about what was hurting him.

Maybe what Ben was saying made sense. But then she shook that thought off. She glanced at him. There were still a few minutes before her stop, and it would be too awkward to sit here in silence the whole time.

So she asked, “What is he doing with the goat milk?”

Ben looked at her questioningly.

“Your uncle,” she explained. “What is he using the goat milk for? Dare I ask?”

“He’s going to make cheese,” Ben said.

“Oh. Was he the one who taught you to play guitar, then? Was he one of those protest singers in the sixties, like Bob Dylan?”

Ben chuckled. “Not quite like Bob Dylan, but yeah. I taught myself to play — it just kinda seemed to come naturally to me — but Uncle Luke studied classical guitar, so he’s helping me improve my technique.”

“It must be nice to have someone like that,” Cassandra said. “Who understands what you like, helps you get better at it.”

Ben looked at her as if realizing this for the first time. “Yeah, I guess it is.”

“Armie and I both like books, reading, that kind of thing — but what he does with his songs, he’s alone. Like an island.”

“Oh, I know that one,” Ben said, grinning. “ _No man is an island_ , right?”

“John Donne, very impressive.”

He shrugged again and laughed self-consciously. “I don’t know what it’s from.”

Cassandra imagined Ben and Armitage together, Ben looking over Armitage's shoulder as he read, Armitage explaining literary allusions. It would be so nice to see him like that. Happy. How could she want so much for another person?

Across the aisle, Ben’s eyes had grown soft and reflected the dull light coming through the rain-spattered windows. “That _would_ be nice,” he said.

Cassandra started, and then a shiver ran through her limbs, tingled at the base of her skull, and she sucked in her breath.

“Sorry,” Ben said, dropping his gaze. “I shouldn’t have —”

“No, it’s… Oh, next stop is mine,” she said, pulling the cord. “Like I said, I'll be in touch.”

She gave him a wobbly smile, as if to reassure him that he hadn’t scared her away. The bus stopped.

“Well…. _Never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee_ and all that,” she said, standing and giving a little wave.

She wondered what Ben was thinking as she stepped off the bus. Looking up, she saw his dark-featured face in the window, distorted by the rain. He raised his big hand at her, palm out.

* * *

Cassandra dumped her Wellies in the tiny entryway and then bound up the stairs. Armitage’s bedroom door was closed, the muffled sound of some 1950s crooner wailing through it. Cassandra wondered if it was to hide the sound of Armitage’s own crying. When he had appeared at all outside of his room in the last few days, silently carrying down tea mugs and plates with toast crumbs on them, his eyes had been red and puffy.

It could all get better if Ben were telling the truth — and Cassandra thought he was. Even if it was all rubbish, it was rubbish that Ben believed. And the comment about Armitage writing about him in AMW — well, that seemed like part of Ben’s excitement about Armitage in general. But he had injured Armitage’s pride, and those wounds didn’t heal. Once made, their father kept them perpetually raw with his insults, and who knew what Armitage had to endure when he went to the First Order office every day.

She went into her room and peeled off her rain-soaked knee socks and school blazer and searched through her books. She then went to his door, barefoot and bearing a copy of _Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions_ by John Donne, the page with Meditation 17 on it marked with a ribbon.

She knocked. “Armie? It’s me.”

The crooning stopped abruptly. “Come in.”

He was lying on his bed, hands tucked under his head with his bony elbows pointed out, his knees jutting up, making a stark contrast with the poster of Oscar Wilde languidly lounging on a chaise that hung above him. His record player was on the floor next to the bed, along with a dozen balls of crumpled paper. A filmy scarf was draped over the lamp on his bedside table to dim it.

“What are you doing?” Cassandra asked, sitting at the foot of the bed.

“Mmm, hard to say,” Armitage said. “Moping isn’t quite right. Nor is sulking. Languishing is _far_ too romantic. Wallowing? That’s probably closest. I’m wallowing.”

“Armie, you can’t go on like this. Maybe you should just forgive Ben and start over.”

Armitage sighed and untucked one of his hands so he could push his hair off his face and rub the two-days’ of ginger stubble on his jaw.

“It’s not about forgiving Ben. I’m still not over him trying to use me —”

“But what if he wasn't’?” Cassandra cut in.

“It doesn’t matter. He made me see how desperate I am. If I saw him again it would just remind me, and I couldn’t stand that. I can hardly stand to face myself as it is.”

“Don’t be ashamed of wanting someone to understand you.”

“I shouldn’t want it that much, Cass. Not in that way.”

She leaned back on the wall. “Oh, who bloody cares about _should_? I thought you of all people know better than that.”

Armitage sat up, drawing his knees to his chest. She saw now the dark hollows under his eyes, the exhaustion in them.

“Why would I know that _of all people_? I’m not special, Cass. I think I am sometimes. I act like I am, just to fool myself most of the time. But there’s no reason I, in particular, shouldn’t give up on my dreams, get a job at bloody First Order Manufacturing, and live out my life losing a little bit more of who I am every day. It’s what other people do, and why am I any better than they are?”

She blinked quickly to stop the stinging that was beginning to prick at her eyes. “Armie, that’s not true. And you know it. You’re trying to convince yourself you’re _not_ special, not the other way around.” She scooted over to him. “We owe it to Mum and to ourselves — not to become whatever it is that… _he_ wants us to be.”

Armitage closed his eyes. “He says that FOM is going to offer me a position. Apparently, I’ve impressed them with my ‘diligence and attention to detail.’”

“ _You never!_ ” Cassandra cried, pressing her hand to her mouth to cover the giggle that erupted.

“I’m just as surprised as you are.”

“You’re not going to take it, though.”

Armitage didn’t answer.

“Armie, that’s no place fo you. Maybe you could go to university. Teach literature.” She smiled at him. “Get a roll-neck jumper and a tweed coat with elbow patches. Professor Armitage Fitzhux sounds rather splendid, doesn’t it?”

He put his chin on his knee to meet her eye level. “We both know that’s not what I’m meant for,” he said. “No more than you’re meant to be the smiling wife of some executive, holding a dry martini and slippers for him when he comes home.”

Cassandra giggled and gave him a gentle headbutt.

“We’re a pair, aren’t we? The General has tried so hard not to be _working class_ , only to have a couple of Fitzes who swung around the wrong way entirely and are useless intellectuals.”

“Ah, but _perfectly_ useless,” Armitage said.

They smiled at each other, and said simultaneously. “ _All art is quite useless_.”

“You see?” Armitage said. “I don’t need some barmy boy to find me fascinating. I have you to understand me. We can be an eccentric brother and sister, living alone in a cottage on the moors like the Brontёs.”

“You don’t mean that. Besides, before long, I’d get tired of you and your extended periods of malaise and chuck you out into the mist, and you’d be driven mad by the ghosts that roam the heather, moaning.”

“That dangling participle, Cassandra! Who is moaning — am I or are the ghosts?”

Cassandra scoffed. “You’ll not be moaning any time at all if you don’t make up with Ben, and quick.”

He scowled at her.

“Oh, don’t be angry, beloved frater,” she said. “Look, I forgot to show you — I brought you a gift, and now it’s a peace offering.”

She held out the slim volume out to him.

“John Donne?” Armitage asked, taking it. “How very C of E of you! And us baptized in the One, Holy, and Apostolic Roman Catholic Church.”

“Don’t joke,” she said. “Something just told me it would help you.”

“ _Something?_ ”

Cassandra smiled as he opened it to the marked page. “Just a feeling.” As she spoke, she nudged one of the balls of paper toward her with her bare foot, curling her toes around it.

He lay down again and put the book up his face. “Go on, then. Leave me to my meditation.”

She gave his knees a nudge and then stood, dragging the ball of paper behind her before making an elaborate curtsy as cover as she swept it up into her hand.

“That’s my move,” Armitage said without looking away from the book. “Get your own.”

“But what will I do when I meet the Queen?” Cassandra said. She put the paper in the pocket of her school kilt.

“Bow like a proper gentleman. Now, out — I’m up to _when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language,_ and I need to concentrate.”

“All right,” Cassandra said, looking at him in the dim, warm light. In it, his hair was warm and coppery, like a tea kettle, and she could see — dare she hope? — a slight curve in his pink bow lips. _We’re very pretty people_ , she thought. _No wonder Ben is mad for him_. And then she said, “Good night, Armie,” and left the room as he waved a slender hand at her.


	5. V - Will Nature Make a Man of Me Yet?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben tries to avoid Armitage and fails. He tries to explain Armitage to his uncle, and maybe gets a bit too carried away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of the chapter is from "This Charming Man" by The Smiths.
> 
>  

### Chapter 5

#### Will Nature Make a Man of Me Yet?

Ben couldn’t help it. He tried to avoid Armitage — but there he was in his oversized gray tweed overcoat coming around the corner with his friend Phasma, a block ahead. Ben had to duck into the tobacconist’s shop and peer out the window through the shelves of newspapers until he passed. He tried to _not_ avoid Armitage, thinking he could trick whatever it was that was making their paths cross. That worked for awhile, since it seemed Armitage had stopped going to the First Order offices and the record shop, but he turned up at the office after a week, wearing very respectable trousers and blazer over a button-down and burgundy sweater vest, his ginger hair cut shorter than Ben had ever seen it, but still falling over his forehead and brushing the tortoiseshell frames of his glasses. Swearing under his breath, Ben got on a bus that was pulling up at the nearest stop, oblivious to where it was going.

When he finally arrived back at his flat, an hour later than he said he’d be, Luke was elbow-deep in cheesemaking, swathed in an apron, with his hair and beard tucked into nets. He’d been experimenting with new formulations and the flat constantly smelled of the pungent scent of goat milk.

“Don’t come in the kitchen!” Luke said when Ben looked in and greeted him. “I’ve got to keep my work area sterile!”

“I wasn’t coming in anyway,” Ben said. “You look like a mad scientist.”

“I could have used your help wrestling with the boiler,” Luke said. “What happened?’

“I got on the wrong bus.” Ben leaned on the door jamb, idly kicking his boot heel against the lime green linoleum floor.

“Ben, you’ve lived here for four years. How could you make that mistake?”

“I got on the wrong bus _on purpose_. I was avoiding someone.”

Luke wiped his hands, covered in cheese curd, on his apron and then went to wash them. “Do you want to talk about why?”

Ben considered for a moment, pressing his lips together. He thought of Armitage, of his profile as he walked by the tobacconist, his instantly recognizable slim silhouette and gait, his hands behind his back, elbows turned out, as he came down the street. Ben had _liked_ seeing him even though he was supposed to be staying away from him. It was secret, it was forbidden — and, he reminded himself, it was _accidental_. He didn’t have anything to reproach himself with.

Still, he wanted to keep it to himself. Not that it was entirely possible, though, judging by the way his uncle gazed at him with his clear, intense blue eyes, his craggy face creased in concern.

“Not really,” Ben finally said. “Anyway, you know what’s going on — at least whatever it is you’re seeing now.”

Luke sighed and began to untie his apron. “Ben, we’ve talked about this. You have to stop relying on that. Nobody else here — well, that we _know of_ — can do what we do, and you need to learn how to express yourself. _Responsibly_.” Luke took off the apron and tossed it onto the counter. “That means somewhere between saying nothing and saying _everything_.”

Ben ducked his head. “Yeah,” he said, nodding. “Yeah.”

“Now,” Luke said. “I’ll meet you halfway. Sound good?”

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“Whether you’re going to take those stupid hairnets off,” Ben said, grinning. “I can’t take you seriously with them on.”

Luke laughed in response, pulling them off his hair and beard. His hair tumbled out over his shoulders, light brown streaked with gray, and he rubbed his hands over his beard.

“All right, let’s sit down,” Luke said.

The sitting room was furnished with Danish Modern pieces from a decade before — warm wood in sleek lines, upholstered in striped gold, orange, and green. An enormous pebble painting of the Buddha hung on the wall. Ben sat on the sofa, folding up his long legs and hanging his big hands between his knees. Luke sat cross-legged on a beanbag on the floor, groaning as he eased himself down, and then looked up at his nephew, his eyes kindly, patient, but also with a hint of mischief — and Ben knew from experience that his uncle wouldn’t fail to call out his bullshit if that’s what the situation required.

“So you wanna tell me about this redhead boy who’s been pacing through your brain for the past two weeks?” Luke asked. “It’s been making me dizzy, seeing him all the time.”

Ben took a breath in. “He’s not a boy, not really — he’s older than me, twenty-one, I think? He works at First Order, but that’s not _really_ what he does — he writes about music, and his sister says he writes songs, too, but I haven’t heard any. His brain, though — the way his mind works is so — so _calculating_. Like he’s an artist but he also knows how to make things _work_?” Ben raised his hands, gesturing as if molding a ball of clay. “That’s why he’s so good at writing about music — he can hear what each part is doing and how it affects the whole. Not like me — you know I do so much just because… _because_ , but I hear everything at once and have trouble figuring out _why_ it works. But he maybe thinks _too much_? Like he’s afraid to _feel_. I really think that making music with each other would be great, you know? Teach us both a lot.” He paused to take another breath.

“But?” Luke said.

“But I fucked up,” Ben said. “I got too excited and made him think I wanted publicity instead to get to know him and — rrrrrggghhh!” He put his fingers in his hair and gripped his temples with his palms as he growled. “Like you said, I said _everything_ — just no stop between my brain and my mouth.”

“All right,” Luke said, in his “ _let’s calm Ben down”_ voice that was both annoying and, even more annoyingly, calming. “So there was a misunderstanding. People have them all the time and they get through them. Yeah?”

Ben rubbed his palms on his knees. “Yeah.”

“First, does this boy have a name?”

“Oh — I didn’t — yeah, he does. It’s Armitage. Armitage Hux.”

Luke frowned. “Any relation to titan of industry Brendol Hux?”

“Yeah, that’s his dad.”

Luke shook his head. “OK, that’s not great.”

“What? Why? Is there —”

Luke raised his hands in a gentle _stop_ gesture. “Not great, but nothing we can’t work through.” He set his hands back down, folded in his lap. “I crossed paths with Brendol Hux a few times when I first came to Arkanis. Four of the worker bees from the factory — kids about your age or a little older —  left and came to study meditation with me.I helped a couple of them apply to university. The others went to work in jobs that suited them better. It didn’t sit well with him for some reason. He accused me of corrupting youth — which made me laugh, since that’s what they accused Socrates of, too — threatened to have me deported from the country. He sent the police over half a dozen times, but he was just one of the factory managers then, not running the whole operation, so he didn’t have the same clout. The woman who was general manager then reined him in eventually.”

Ben frowned. “That doesn’t make sense, Uncle Luke. Why would he be so obsessed with you? Over four kids?”

Luke shrugged. “Some people can’t stand having the status quo shaken up. The establishment feels safe. Those kids’ friends saw they didn’t have to go straight from secondary school to the factory, like their parents did. If kids stop taking factory jobs, if they start getting ideas about getting above their station — who’s going to be the cogs, then?”

Ben nodded. He thought about Armitage. He had tried not to see too much of Armitage’s mind — Uncle Luke said he shouldn’t get to deep into people’s heads; they didn’t like that — but what he had seen was Armitage’s beliefs. And those beliefs were in his own mind and his own creativity. But then there was something _else_ — not doubting the beliefs, but doubting that he even _should have_ those beliefs. There was an influence there that Ben hadn’t been able to work out, but now he knew — that was Brendol Hux.

And suddenly he _hated_ Armitage’s father. He didn’t have to think about if it was right or reasonable, he just knew he _had_ to. He had to hate him.

“Easy there, Ben,” Luke said. “Don’t give in to your baser instincts.”

Ben glowered at his uncle. “My instincts are always right.”

“Maybe. But what you _do_ because of them isn’t.” Luke rubbed his beard.  “And you’re going to have to keep that in check because this could get _messy_.”

“Like most things do when I’m involved.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You thought it, though.”

Luke tucked his lips in and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I did.”

“It’s OK,” Ben said. “It’s true.”

“You gotta know that’s half your charm. Maybe even more than half. Your dad always says that.”

“But not my mom.”

Luke gave an exaggerated shrug. “Leia… well, she’s _Leia._ She wants things to be easier for you.”

“She doesn’t get that the things that she thinks matter are easy for her because she’s _good at them_ ,” Ben said.

“My twin _is_ an insufferable know-it-all. Trust me, I know this. I’m the weird brother of the state of New York’s first female senator, remember? She’s figuring it out — you’re good at the stuff _you’re_ good at.” Luke resettled himself on the beanbag. “So, look. Brendol Hux is not a… tolerant man. Do you understand what I mean?”

Ben nodded.

“I didn’t know his son’s name, but when Brendol was accusing me of corrupting the kids who used to work for him, that was his thing — saying it was people like me who would turn his son into… well, he used a word I won’t repeat.” Luke leaned forward and held his nephew in his gaze until Ben raised his eyes. “So just know that I support you, you know that. But I also don’t want you to get hurt.”

“I know, Uncle Luke.”

“So is this boy worth it?”

Ben didn't hesitate. “Yes.”

Luke slaps his palms against his knees. “Well, there you go. Now, help an old man up.”

He held out his hand, and Ben stood and took it, helping to haul up his uncle, who actually could get up just fine on his own, Ben knew. Just another one of Luke’s tricks to make sure there was contact and camaraderie between them. Even though Ben knew it was a ruse, it still worked.

“Seems like you could do with some meditation tonight,” Luke said, raising his eyebrows. “Get your mind clear so you can see the path forward.”

Ben sighed. “OK.”

“Remember,” Luke said as he headed back into the kitchen. “Focus on your —”

“Breathing. Yeah, I know.”

“See you in the morning, kid.”

* * *

It wasn’t working.  Ben kept closing his eyes, trying to clear his head, but it seemed impossible. He tried sitting up, lying down, hanging over the side of his bed. He even tried standing on his head, which resulted in him crashing down into his bookshelf and knocking it over. The downstairs neighbor pounded on the ceiling, and Luke called “Ben?” from the kitchen.

“Sorry! I’m OK!” Ben yelled, both the his uncle and the neighbor.

“ _Focus_ , Ben!” Luke yelled back.

Ben sat back down, cross-legged, on the floor, wiggling into the rug, squeezing his eyes shut, trying to slow his breathing. Sometimes it did work, and he could find a stillness inside of himself that enveloped him and quieted the churning of his mind. But now — no matter what he did, there he was.

 _Armitage_.

The image that came to him first was always the first time he saw him — walking up behind Cassandra with the silvery Arkanis sunlight shining on his hair. He had been slightly rumpled but gave the impression of also having given great care to what he was wearing — charcoal gray wool slacks and a tweed blazer over a button-up shirt. When he had gotten close, Ben had seen that the shirt was patterned with what looked like red cogs — a commentary on First Order, maybe? The sea green of Armitage’s eyes was clear through his glasses, and the way they had met his own had filled Ben with the certainty he so often felt, his instincts pointing in the right direction. But it was something he had never felt about another person before. This person was _his_.

Sure, he’d had the odd crush here and there. When he was 13, he’d become infatuated with his mother’s intern, Poe Dameron, and the intensity of it had bled into the air, practically, until Poe, confused, had almost quit. Ben’s mother, who understood something about being able to have an uncanny effect on the world around her — it was the family trait — had come to his room to talk through it. But he had been mortified. His cheeks had burned, he remembered, and it was like the heat of it burst from him. He had yelled, “Get out! _Get out!_ ” at his mother, both out of anger and fear, and the lightbulb in his lamp had burst.

That was when it became too much, he thought. And _that_ — what he had felt about Poe, was _nothing_ really, compared to this. Just a fascination with Poe’s good looks and easy charm — he was the kind of man who could smile at men and women alike and make them feel there was a deep connection, and one that they wanted. The opposite of Ben, in other words. And because of that, Ben had felt a certain satisfaction in unmooring Poe’s suave assurance.

He could never feel the same thing about Armitage. Ben wanted Armitage to feel perfectly safe with him, as if their being together were part of nature itself. And it seemed like he could have made that happen. He thought of that slight body that had been so close to his. Not in height — Armitage was almost as tall as he was — but so slender. Ben had wanted to put his thumbs against bones of his hips, curl his fingers around him, and draw him towards himself, to put his hands around Armitage’s skinny wrists, gently, just to see how far they’d wrap around. He wanted to _admire_ him, and not from a distance — he wanted to know everything about him, to hear his voice, his breath on the side of his face again.

That thought made Ben shudder with the memory, and he lost the rhythm of his breathing. His eyes flickered open, but he quickly closed them again, not wanting to lose the image of Armitage, standing nearly against him under the awning near New Republic. Before he had ruined everything. He had held his hand and led him outside, twined his hand around Armitage’s pinky, and for a moment their breath and pulses has quickened in unison, and everything seemed on the verge of beginning.

Ben grunted in frustration as a familiar ache throbbed between his legs, a pressure spreading outward. He had hoped to avoid it — the desire that he had no way of fulfilling, not without Armitage. Sure, he could picture his green eyes, his pink lips, the flush rising from the neckline of his T-shirt, settling into the hollows of his collarbones — he could imagine putting his hand on his cheek, leaning forward to meet those lips, and simply let his hand travel downward, taking hold of himself and stroking as he imagined Armitage would.

But it wasn’t real. And what Ben Solo craved more than anything else was something _real._ The meditation, the realm where his instincts and ability to influence resided, the way he could follow people’s thoughts and feelings to their own desires — it was all so intangible, something he sensed but couldn’t get his hands around. He wanted his hands around Armitage Hux, wanted to feel the smooth skin over his ribs, the curve of the small of his back.

It was no use. Ben couldn’t help it. He’d unzipped his jeans and had his hand around himself. He squeezed, not stroking, for a moment, wondering. In everything he had felt from Armitage — and there had been _a lot_ — sex had been a tantalizing absence. Not necessarily because it wasn’t _there_ , but because it was something he kept hidden. People had those parts of them, what they didn’t want to face, and it took extra effort to see them — effort that Ben had been taught not to make. It was an intrusion, a violation — an assault, even.

What he longed for now, was for Armitage to show him that hidden part of his mind, to share with him what he desired — to let Ben see what he wanted. And to let Ben _do_ what he wanted.

Thinking of this, of all the possibilities, he began moving his hand and his hips. He focused on the rhythm and his breath, and this, he felt, was its own kind of meditation. And if the mantra on his lips was _Armitage_ , and the image in his mind was the curve of his lips, then so be it. Right now, it was what he needed.


	6. VI - The Soil Falling Over My Head

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage has had a decision about his future made for him, one that makes the future seem hardly worth pursuing. Phasma tries to snap him out of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CONTENT WARNING: Allusion to self-harm/suicide, use of a gendered slur
> 
> The title of this chapter is from "I Know It's Over" by The Smiths. (A line from the song is also used in the chapter as Armitage's writing.)

### Chapter 6

#### The Soil Falling Over His Head

Phasma didn’t hear from Armitage for three days. She called when he would be the only one home, and there was no answer. On the fourth day, she went to his house. It was late afternoon, when the shadows were beginning to lengthen, though the chilliness of Arkanis spring had overtaken the frigid bite of Arkanis winter. The sun behind the terrace houses cast the street in semi-darkness.

Cassandra answered the door. She was wearing a terry cloth bathrobe and slippers, her hair bedraggled, bruise-like smudges under her eyes.

“Hello, Phasma,” she said, her voice gravelly. She beckoned her inside. “I guess you’ve come to see the invalid?”

Phasma closed the door behind her and looked up the stairs with alarm. “Invalid? Is he ill?”

“We both have colds,” Cassandra said. “But in addition to that, he’s an utter, utter tosser. He wasn’t getting out of bed even before he got sick.”

“Is he that upset about Ben?” Phasma whispered.

“No, not exactly. It’s Ben, but it’s also what being upset about Ben means, if that makes any sense. Phasma, I’m… I’m worried about him.” Cassandra sniffed and took a crumpled piece of paper from her pocket and held it out. “I nicked this from his room. I haven’t known what to do with it so I’ve just been carrying it about.”

Phasma smoothed out the paper. There, in Armitage’s cramped block letters: _See, the sea wants to take me, the knife wants to slit me. Do you think you can help me?_

“Oh, Cass,” Phasma said.

“I haven’t wanted to leave him alone. Fortunately, the cold gave me an excuse to stay home. You should go up and see him. Maybe you can get through to him. I was going to go make us some tea.”

Phasma put her hand on the younger girl’s shoulder. “No, you go back up to bed. I’ll make us all tea. He’ll keep for a few minutes.”

“Don’t mention the paper, though,” Cass said. “I don’t want him to know I took it.”

Phasma crossed through the tiny sitting room into the narrow kitchen. Leaning against the counter while the kettle heated the water, she looked at the paper again and thought about what she could possibly say to Armitage.

“Sorry about the crippling depression,” she muttered. “Oh by the way, I’m abandoning you to go to art school.”

Their internship had ended the Friday before. Armitage had seemed all right through the last two weeks of it — a bit quiet, a bit prone to wandering into the stairwell and staying there until Shankly started asking where the bloody hell he’d gone off to. But otherwise all right. Tired, maybe, but not depressed. Not any more than usual.

The water came to a boil, and Phasma was pouring it into the teapot when she heard the front door open.

“Don’t be alarmed, Bridget,” she said, coming out of the kitchen. “I’m just making some tea for them.”

Bridget started slightly as she took off her mac and headscarf. When she looked over, Phasma for an instant saw a scared girl, insecure and holding on to as much as she could. Bridget managed a wan smile.

“Oh, Phasma,” she said. “You startled me.”

“The tea’s brewing,” Phasma said. “Sit down. I’ll pour you a cuppa too. I made too much, as usual.”

Bridget sat down on the brown couch, its upholstery worn smooth and shiny. “Thank you. That sounds lovely,” she said.

Phasma bustled in the kitchen, finding some biscuits in a tin on top of the refrigerator and arranging them on plates. She felt ridiculously, but, somehow, comfortingly, domestic and efficient.

“Come sit with me for a little bit,” Bridget said when Phasma came in with the tea and biscuits. “Have you been up to see Armie?”

“No, not yet.”

Bridget dunked her biscuit into her cup. “He won’t tell me what’s wrong. I thought maybe you two had broken up.”

Phasma froze with her cup halfway to her mouth. “Oh,” she said. “Oh, no. I’m afraid we’ve given the wrong impression. Armitage and I aren’t — we’re not seeing each other, not like that.”

Bridget’s face reddened at the cheeks. “Does Cass think you are?”

“No,” Phasma said.

“That girl! She’s been letting me go on thinking that — for her own impish amusement, I suppose.”

“She will do that,” Phasma said. She took a sip of her tea. “She’s too clever by half sometimes, isn’t she?”

“She is. I never really worry about Cass, even when she’s getting into mischief. But Armie…. I thank God every day he isn’t like his father, but I hate that it’s also what has brought him so much hurt in life. I haven’t been able to protect him the way I should.”

Phasma realized that Bridget was putting together the pieces of part of Armitage’s identity, getting nearly the full picture of what she had previously just suspected.

“He doesn’t blame you,” Phasma said. “He adores you.”

“But that’s just the trouble.” Bridget sighed deeply. “Thank you for the tea, dear. You’d better go talk to him.”

Phasma left Bridget, who was sipping her tea wearily, and climbed the stairs, holding a mug in each hand with a plate of biscuits balanced on both. She tapped on Cassandra’s door with her foot and gave her the tea and biscuits. Cassandra took them with a croak of gratitude and a whisper of “Remember, don’t tell him.”

Through Armitage’s door, Phasma heard nothing — none of the melancholy music he usually listened to or the soft sounds of him pacing the floor of his room as if it were a stage, practicing his bows, or even of his voice, singing. Those were the best days, when she bound up the stairs and heard that warble and croon, knowing that the Armitage who opened the door to her would be brimming with ambitions and plans, ready to take on the world. Not tonight. Phasma stood for a moment, unmoving.

 _Hell and bollocks_.

She knocked.

“It’s Phasma,” she said. “Arm?”

“I’m sleeping!” His voice was muffled.

“Well, then you won’t mind if I just tiptoe in and set a cup of tea on your nightstand for you.”

She opened the door. The room was dark, the air close and smelling frankly of _boy_ — oily unwashed hair and choked-back tears. Armitage lay on his stomach, arms folded under his pillow. Phasma cleared a spot on the bedside table, pushing aside a small book and several crumpled pieces of paper, and set down the mug and plate.

“Thank you, goodbye now,” Armitage said into his pillow.

Phasma sat down in his desk chair.

“What’s going on, Hux?” she said sharply, trying to put something of a comedic take on Shankly’s voice in her tone.

“I’m sick,” he said.

“ _Besides_ being sick.”

He didn’t answer, so she continued to sit, looking at him as she leaned back, legs and arms crossed, expectant. He seemed to sense her there and, finally, he flopped over, glared at her with watery eyes, and then turned toward the ceiling.

“I’m sick, and I hurt all over, and I’m exhausted, and life is a long stretch of dark street, punctuated by streetlights that get farther apart the longer you go on until you’re in complete darkness and can’t find your way back, not that you can _ever go_ back, and then the only way is _out_ , and you can’t figure that out either.”

“Wow,” Phasma said.

Armitage turned to her again, “‘Wow’? Your friend is confessing his abject misery to you and you say ‘wow’?”

“Yes, _wow_. That metaphor speaks of a mind that has been working rather busily — the imagery, the play on Virginia Woolf’s ‘life is not a series of gig-lamps symmetrically arranged’.”

“So what?”

“So —” She scooted the chair over to him and then gave his bed a kick. “So you’re a brilliant bloody bastard, and you know it.”

“What use is it, though?” Armitage said, not contradicting her. “I’ve bollocksed up everything that might have made me happy, and I’m about to throw myself headlong into the gears of an unthinking, unfeeling machine.”

“Well, _first of all_ , you don’t have to take the job.”

Armitage dragged himself up to sitting position and blew his nose so forlornly that Phasma thought he was almost enjoying it. But he really wasn’t.

“My father called and told my mother that if I don’t take it, he would be here himself to make sure I _do_. And I can’t subject Cass and Mum to that.”

“But?”

“But I can’t live that life. It’ll turn me into someone I hate — some _thing_ I hate. Someone whom no one who is worth caring about could ever care about themselves.”

“So this is about Ben.”

He leaned back into his headboard. “ _No_.” He coughed. “Well, _yes_. But not specifically about Ben. I can’t ask anyone like him to hitch a ride on the kind of life I’m being pushed into.”

“Then don’t let yourself be pushed,” Phasma said. “Your mother and your sister will understand. They just want you to be happy.”

“You don’t understand. I have a _responsibility_ to them. I have to keep them safe.”

“You can’t keep them safe like this. You’re a bloody mess.”

“I know, and that’s just another way I’ve let them down.”

“Arm. You haven’t let anyone down.” She nodded at the mug on his bedside table. “Drink your tea. Everything will look better after.”

“Why? Did you lace it with lithium?”

“If only I had thought of that. No, just a fuck ton of sugar and milk, the way you so disgustingly like it.”

He picked up the mug and took a tentative sip.

“Seriously, though, mate,” Phasma said. “How are you, really?”

He sighed. “A bit shaken in my resolve, but not in my substance, I think. I just have to bide my time and earn it.”

“Earn what?”

“The moment of my greatness.”

Phasma laughed. “Oh, I have no doubt that you will do that. You’re no Prufrock, you.”

Armitage set down his mug and dabbed at his nose with a tissue. “You think so? Because I doubt. All the time.”

“How much do you doubt? Not enough to not want to try anymore, I hope.”

He looked up at her with bleary eyes and then turned away. “I know everyone is worried about me,” he said. “ _I’m_ worried about me. But I’m fighting it.”

Phasma nodded. She contemplated telling him about art school then, but he was on a precarious edge and could tumble off if nudged.

“Do you want me to stay here with you tonight?” she asked.

“Yes, please,” he replied, the lack of hesitation telling Phasma that the danger he was in was worse than she hoped and less than she feared.

“I’m going to catch your cold, aren’t I?”

“You already have done.”

* * *

Phasma borrowed a pair of his pajamas, left her overalls and black sweater in a pile next to his bed, and curled up next to Armitage as she had before, the night after he had first met Ben.

“When were you planning to tell me?” Armitage asked, not turning away from the wall.

“Tell you what?”

He traced his finger on the faded stylized floral pattern. Some kind of attempt at William Morris imitation.

“About going to art school.”

Some of the tension in Phasma’s shoulders settled. “How do you know?” she asked softly.

“Shankly.”

“Bloody bastard,” Phasma said. “Sorry.”

“Perfectly all right. Your father has been swaggering about telling people, it seems.”

For a moment Phasma was stunned silent. The image of her father — tall, silver-haired, ruthless — vaunting her artistic accomplishments was impossible for her to conjure up.

“Will wonders never cease,” she finally murmured, and then gave Armitage’s shoulder a nudge with her forehead.

He shifted slightly. “Don’t think I can’t be happy about something good happening for you. You deserve it. And you’re not going to be far away. The school is a twenty minute walk from the First Order office.”

“Where you’re sure you’re going to be?”

“For a little while, anyway.”

“Oh, Arm. Just… don’t stay there until it becomes unbearable. Promise me that.”

“I promise you.”

“Promise me something else.”

“What?”

“You’ll let me take you clothes shopping.”

“ _What?_ ” He tried to twist around to look at her, but the bed was too small and she had him held down with a lazy arm draped over his side.

“Trust me. Pretend you’re playing a part, like in a play. You have a wardrobe for it, and when the show is over, it’s over.”

“And then I can go on to being… whom?”

“Anyone you want to be.”

* * *

Armitage was well enough to leave the house two days later. Phasma stayed at the house and, miraculously it seemed to her, did not catch his cold.

“It must have been some virus that only leprechauns are susceptible to,” she said as she leaned into the mirror on his wardrobe door, lining her eyes.

“ _Fey folk_ ,” insisted Armitage.

They went out into the frigid late winter Arkanis air, rainless — and clear from smoke because of the wind blowing in from the moors, cool, with the scent of heather and melancholy.

They walked along the High Street district, and decided to go to the haberdasher’s instead of to the department store. As they turned a corner, Phasma caught a flash of movement ahead — a tall, almost ungainly black-clad boy, practically diving into a store when he saw them. Ben. Phasma managed to distract Armitage and get them past the tobacconist’s where Ben was peeping forlornly through the newsstand without Armitage noticing.

She said nothing about seeing Ben as they picked out wool slacks and smart button-downs and knit waistcoats that Phasma wrinkled her brow and shook her head at but that Armitage insisted on buying. But as the tailor measured Armitage for alterations, she thought about the glimpse she had gotten of Ben’s pleading eyes

Phasma saw him again, a week later, when she was meeting Armitage after he got out of work. She was standing on the corner under her umbrella across the street from the First Order offices when Ben came out out of the record shop on Empire Street and started. She glanced in the direction of his gaze and half a second later saw Armitage come out of the office building. Ben was like a rabbit, alert to his surroundings. She pictured him with ears perked, nose trembling. But, she thought, he had started _before_ Armitage had come out of the building. Maybe Ben was just anticipating it, knowing that Armitage worked there, but hadn’t there been that nonsense about reading minds, showing up at the cemetery the day they happened to be there too? She shook her head at herself. _Phasma, sort yourself out._

Outside the record shop, Ben was near panicking, looking around as if for someone to save him. Across from him, a bus was pulling up to the curb, and Ben darted for it, jumping through the door just before it closed. The poor kid was obviously desperate not to bother Armitage, but still hopelessly besotted.

“I still think you’re wrong,” she told Armitage as they got into her car.

“About anything in specific or just in general?”

“In general, but also specifically — about Ben,” she said.

Armitage sighed. “So what if I am? It just makes it worse. I don’t want to think about it.”

“But you acknowledge that you might be wrong? That you have a _bona fide_ mutual admirer whom you’re avoiding because — what? Fear of happiness?”

“Fear of happiness that is dashed and becomes even worse than _un_ happiness. I’d rather keep myself at this plateau of numb indifference, thank you.”

“But you’re _not_ numbly indifferent!” Phasma cried, switching on her indicator a bit too forcefully before pulling into traffic. “I have never known anyone who _feels_ everything as much as you do but refuses to acknowledge it, Armitage Patrick Hux. Maybe that’s what you’re afraid of, eh?”

“What’s that?”

“Having to _do_ something about what you feel. Having to _do_ something with your talent. Having to do _anything_.”

Next to her, Armitage went silent, a stunned kind of simmering silence that was like a presence in the car with them.

“I’m sorry,” Phasma said as she turned in the direction toward his home. “I didn’t mean to be cruel.”

“You weren’t,” Armitage said. “That’s just it. You weren’t cruel. You were honest. That is what you think of me.”

“Arm —”

“No, you’re right,” he said, his voice resigned. “I’m terrified. The future — it’s a great, yawing unknown. What if I put all my effort into the wrong thing? What if, when I’m looking in one direction, I’m missing the perfect opportunity in the other? And what if what seems like the perfect opportunity is just another chance for me to be laid lower?”

“Nobody knows, Arm,” Phasma answered. “Can’t you just try to do what will make you happy? See what happens? I promise it won’t be the end of the world.”

“It might be easier if it was,” he said.

And then they both laughed. Armitage was lucky he was _worth_ all the trouble it took to be his friend, Phasma mused. Even if she wanted to shake him most of the time.

But as they pulled up to his house, Armitage stiffened and gripped the seat.

“Bollocks,” he murmured.

Phasma looked at his house. Parked in front of it was a large black car with a driver reading a newspaper in the front seat.

“Is that…?”

“Yes, unfortunately,” Armitage said. “The General’s here. Probably to tell me that Shankly’s positive evaluation of me must have been a mistake and he’ll soon have the error corrected by informing all of my co-workers that I am, in fact, to use his favorite phrase, ‘a useless cunt’.”

Phasma parked her two-door behind Brendol’s car. Armitage pulled up the lock on his door, but then sat without moving, staring at the front door of his own house.

“Are you going to go in?” Phasma asked.

“No. Yes,” Armitage said. He shifted in his seat as if to rise, then leaned back again. “I mean, what he’s probably putting Mum and Cass through right now.”

“Do you want me to come in with you?”

“No, best not.”

“Do you want me to wait until he’s gone and then come in?” Phasma kept her voice carefully inquiring, so as not to give away that there was no way in hell she was going to let him walk into that furnace and then just _leave_.

Armitage nodded. “Don’t stay parked here, though. You don’t want to be in his line of sight when he leaves, or you might end up cursed to the seventh generation.”

“Men like your father don’t scare me.”

Armitage opened the car door and turned before getting out. “I admire that, really I do, Phasma. But it is pure stupidity. You should always fear monsters. If not for your own sake, then for others’.”

The set of Phasma’s mouth wavered as she made a small nod and Armitage closed the door. She watched him walk up to his house, and his mother open the door before he could get his key out. And she saw, in the inner shadows of the house, a silhouetted figure, looming like fear itself. She swore under her breath and then pulled her car around the corner to wait.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phasma here is completely out of character, I realize. The real Phasma would probably think, "The General is depressed and therefore weak. Now is the time to cultivate a relationship with his replacement and plan Hux's demise." But what might have Phasma been if she weren't raised in a post-nuclear-apocalypse wasteland but instead in a posh suburb outside of an industrial city, where her father owns the biggest employer in the county?


	7. VII - The Military Two-Step Down the Nape of My Neck

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage arrives home after a day as a drone at the First Order office and finds his father is there. And so into the lion's den. Armitage thinks he’s prepared, but Brendol has more than the usual ways of hurting him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CONTENT WARNING: Brendol Hux. Verbal and physical abuse, sexist slurs, sex worker slur, homophobia.
> 
> The title of this chapter is from ["The Headmaster Ritual" by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/dTC5NmoFJts?t=26s).

### Chapter 7

#### The Military Two-Step Down the Nape of My Neck

Armitage walked into the house determined not to falter. He exchanged grim, tight-lipped looks of solidarity with Bridget, who was in her gray work skirt and white blouse with a drooping pussy bow, and Cassandra, who was still sick and in her robe and slippers. There was toad in the hole in the oven for dinner by the smell of it, but he wasn’t walking into a scene of a happy family supper.

Brendol Hux stood behind Bridget with his hands clasped behind his back and his chin tucked into his neck. Belly thrust out, jawline lost in his neck, he looked like caricature, a cartoon. Wimpy from _Popeye_ in a pinstriped suit. Armitage held onto that image as he walked as if on coals to his father. He held out his hand.

“Father,” he said. “Good evening.”

Brendol took his hand. As his father’s cold fingertips curled around his hand, Armitage concealed his disgust. Brendol’s hand, broad and short-fingered, was so different from the last that had held his. Ben’s — so big that his slender one had almost disappeared in Ben’s soft grasp.

“I’ve brought you something,” Brendol said, releasing Armitage’s hand and gesturing for him to go into the sitting room, as if the terrace house were his home and Armitage were the guest there. “Something for your future.”

“Indeed?” Armitage said, walking in and turning immediately, keeping Brendol from going any farther in the house. “I can’t recall a time when you came bearing so many gifts as you have lately. What have I done to deserve the honor?”

Brendol’s ice blue eyes grew harder, and he held Armitage in his gaze. Armitage wondered if his father were deciding whether his tone deserved reprimand. With a deep breath in, Brendol evidently decided to move on. He took an envelope from his breast pocket and handed it to Armitage.

 _This is my father_ , Armitage thought, taking it. _This is all he is to me. An endless series of envelopes taken from breast pockets._

“A trust deed,” Armitage said, not looking up from the paper.

“For your salary,” Brendol said. “I will hold it in a discretionary trust, ensuring the funds are properly managed until you reach the age of twenty-five. Since you are over eighteen, however, you will need to sign it.”

Armitage did look up then. Brendol’s face was smug, daring Armitage to object.

“I won’t have use of my own money, then,” Armitage said.

“You will get an allowance, and you may request additional funds for expenses as they come up.” Brendol walked around Armitage, farther into the sitting room. “I’m sure you’ll see that this is in your own best interest — as well as your mother’s and sister’s.”

There was an unspoken threat in his tone — that Armitage’s position, the money he gave to Bridget, the house, Cassandra’s school fees could be made to disappear should Armitage refuse. Brendol held out a pen. Armitage took it, a weighty thing for its size — the kind of pen men like Brendol Hux carried just to impress upon others the import of a deal, its permanence. Instead of signing, though, he sat down on the old sofa and set the pen on the coffee table. He took his glasses from the pocket of his tweed blazer — where he’d put them before coming into the house — put them on, and began to read.

“What happens to the money if I die before I turn twenty-five?” he asked.

“Armie…” Cassandra said from the doorway to the sitting room. “Don’t.”

Brendol _hmphed_ somewhat approvingly. “I’m surprised that you thought of such a contingency. In such an event, your designated next of kin would inherit the funds.”

“And who is that?”

“Unless you marry in the meantime,” — he smirked to express his opinion of the unlikeliness of that happening — “your mother and I are. It would be divided equally.”

“ _No_ ,” Armitage said. “I want to designate Cassandra my next of kin, with the trust transferring to Mum in the event of my death.”

Brendol’s chest heaved and he pressed his lips together. “Listen, boy — don’t toy with me.” He breathed in again and seemed to gain some control over the rage building behind his cold eyes. “ _If_ I agree to the change, there will be certain scenarios that will render such a clause void. In the case of suicide, for example.”

In the doorway, Cassandra made a sudden whimper and then fled up the stairs. Armitage glanced over, but then he held his father’s gaze.

“Mum, you can check on Cass, I’m all right,” Armitage said, without looking away.

Bridget made her way up the stairs after Cassandra.

Armitage folded the trust, put it back in the envelope, picked up the pen from the table, and then stood to hand them both back to Brendol. “I’ll sign this once it’s been revised.”

An angry flush was creeping up Brendol’s neck, making his blotchy face even more livid than usual. His eyes roved over his son, looking for a way in, a place to drive home the knife, or to at least to needle at.

“Or maybe there’s a way I can convince you that you don’t need to make those changes.” Brendol looked over Armitage, taking in his newly shorter hair, his haberdashery-acquired shirt, sweater vest, and tweed blazer. “Well, at least you’ve finally caught on that your wardrobe was wholly unsuited to a professional life,” he said, abruptly changing subjects — or at least seeming to. “Though you still look like a damn swot. I suppose it would be asking too much for you not to do.”

Armitage was puzzled, but he forced a closed-lip smile. “Yes, one must look the part of a Junior Technical Writer.”

“Scyre Sterling may boast all he likes about that daughter of his, but at least I’ll have a son who looks respectable,” Brendol said. “I daresay she won’t want to associate with _you_ once she’s gotten ensconced with the artistic eccentrics she’ll meet in that so-called ‘art school.’”

Brendol was going someplace with this, Armitage was certain — but it wasn’t clear _where_.

“Yes, you two have been _very_ cozy. And I’d say ‘bravo, son,’ if we both didn’t know where your _disgusting_ proclivities lie.”

Armitage looked with loathing at Brendol’s two shiny marble-like eyes, set deep in his fleshy face, at the fleck that had landed on his lower lip when he spat _proclivities_.

“After my last visit, I realized I need to keep better tabs on you, especially now that you're representing First Order Manufacturing in a professional capacity. I have eyes all over this city,” Brendol continued. “You were seen going to a discotheque with the Sterling girl and Cassandra — which I’ve had to have _words_ with your mother about — and then _leaving_ that same establishment with a certain American _boy_.”

A trembling began in Armitage’s belly. A deep dread pulled at him, trying to push him to run, get away — but there was nowhere to go.

“That’s right, I _know_ ,” Brendol said, taking a step toward Armitage. “And I know who the boy is, too. Ben Solo, son of Senator Leia Organa of New York, nephew of Luke Skywalker, who spent the last decade turning boys like you into exactly what you _are_. _He_ sent his nephew after you, just to get at me.”

Armitage blinked back the tears that threatened to surge forth, and his father laughed cruelly. _The son of an American_ _senator_ _? What in the world was he doing here in Arkanis, uncle or no?_

“Daddy….” It was Cassandra. She had come back down and was standing in the doorway once more, with Bridget.

“Listen and learn, Cassandra,” Brendol said. “Your brother’s example is a lesson.” He turned back to Armitage. “You didn’t think that pretty rent boy _liked_ you did you? You’re just easy prey for perverts — weak-willed, thin as a slip of paper, and just as —”

“Yes, I know, _useless_ ,” Armitage said, hissing. “You’ve _told_ me.”

And before he could even flinch, his father had hit him across his mouth with the back of the hand and Bridget and Cassandra were crying out, rushing toward him from the doorway.

“Stay _back_ ,” Brendol said to them, then loomed over Armitage. “You do _not_ interrupt me, boy. You will make something of yourself other than the worthless cunt you are presently are, I’ll make sure of it —”

“Or what?” Armitage said, wiping away the blood that had trickled onto his chin with the back of his hand. “You’ll make me lose my position? Put Mum and Cass on the street? Everyone already suspects just what kind of sick man you are, did you know that? That would only confirm it.”

When Brendol moved to strike him again, Armitage was ready for it. He managed to take hold of Brendol’s arm. But Brendol, in his rage, could not be stopped. His left hand was a fist, and he connected, in an inelegant swing, with the side of Armitage’s head. And as sparks flew from the center of Armitage’s vision outward, where the edges were darkening, he heard his mother and sister scream.

“I said _stay back_ ,” Brendol said to them.

And he was reaching out — to grab Cassandra, who was running toward her father. Armitage realized this through the ringing in his head, so he lunged forward, wrapping his long arms around Brendol’s shoulders, clasping his right hand around his left wrist, desperately pinning Brendol’s arms down. Cassandra got away and pressed herself against the wall behind Armitage before Brendol threw him off. The wind knocked out of him, Armitage lay gasping as Brendol stood over him, shaking his suit jacket back into place.

“Pathetic,” Brendol said.

Armitage managed to rise to his knees, coughing, and Cassandra dropped to floor beside him.

“Armie?” she whispered. “What should I do?”

“Get somewhere safe,” Armitage managed to whisper. “The kitchen — the back door. Phasma is outside, in her car.”

“But... Mum.”

Both of them darted their eyes over to Bridget in the sitting room doorway, trying to make her way over to them without attracting Brendol’s attention. Brendol took a step toward them. Cassandra moved as if to get between him and her brother, but Armitage held her behind him.

“Let me tell you some more about Ben Solo, Armitage,” Brendol said, now tugging down the cuffs of his shirt. “I had my solicitor look into what happened before he came here. The findings were quite telling. Arrest records for assault and battery, property destruction, _arson_. All by the age of fourteen. And yet no charges pressed, nothing brought to trial, everything swept very nicely under the rug with confidential settlements and dear Mummy’s influence. He’s a violent delinquent and a degenerate. And you almost got taken in by him.

“All of this is well-documented by the way,” Brendol continued. “It could become a matter of public knowledge _so_ easily. Now. Do you still want to make changes to the trust deed?”

Armitage sat back on his heels, and looked up, defiant.

“Yes,” he said, as clearly as he could through his cut lip and muffled hearing. His father didn’t know as much as he thought he did if he believed Armitage would place Ben Solo’s reputation above his mother and sister.

“Have it your way,” Brendol said. He looked his son over as Armitage stood. “Take a few days off until you heal up. I’ll get it cleared with Shankly and personnel.”

Weakly at first, and then harder so that he had to hold on to the back of the sofa as he winced, Armitage laughed. It began as a squeak in his throat and then became full and deep, clearly mocking. Bridget mustered the courage to inch around Brendol. She put her arm around Armitage’s shoulders and leaned her head toward his.

“Ssshhh, Armie. Please.”

“And just what is so bloody amusing?” Brendol asked.

Armitage straightened and wiped off tears — whether of laughter or from pain, he wasn’t sure.

“Yes, I’ll take a few days off,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to disgrace the family name by displaying the cuts and bruises the patriarch gave me, now would I?”

“Armie….” Cassandra said from the floor. She was hedging toward him, but her eyes were locked on Brendol, waiting for him to strike again.

“Someday, Armitage, you’ll cross someone with that big mouth of yours, and they’ll not have the same fatherly regard as I do,” Brendol said. “And when you can’t put yourself back together again, you’ll have no one to blame but yourself.” He tucked the envelope with the trust deed back into his pocket. “I’ll have my solicitor deliver the revised trust for your signature. Be back in the office by next Monday.”

Brendol Hux left the house without a look back. When the front door slammed closed, a sob wracked Bridget’s body and she trembled until she could master it. She turned to Armitage and reached up to hold his face in her hands.

“Cassandra,” she said evenly, calmly, “please go get the first aid kit and a bag of frozen peas from the kitchen. And take the toad in the hole out of the oven.”

Cassandra rose from the floor, moving mechanically, seemingly oblivious to the tears on her cheeks, dripping off the edge of her jaw, rolling down her neck.

“Cass,” Armitage said, turning to her. His throat was dry, his voice thin, scratchy. “Cass, I’m all right.”

She looked at him, her eyes, those mirror images of his own, large and pleading and running with tears. It hurt worse than any of the wounds inflicted on him, seeing his headstrong sister silently weeping for him.

“No,” she said. “You’re not. None of us is all right. None of _this_ is all right.”

She went into the kitchen. There was a tapping at the back door as she entered, and she yelped. Armitage tensed, but then he remembered.

“It’ll be Phasma,” he said.

Cassandra opened the door, and Phasma blew in with the cold air, a rush of leather and platinum hair.

“Bloody hell!” she cried when she saw Armitage. “What — did he —”

“Our so-called father,” Cassandra said, coming in with the bag of peas and a shoebox.

She handed the peas to Armitage, who pressed the bag to the side of his face, and the shoebox to Bridget, then sank down on the sofa with her arms knees drawn up, her arms clutched around her shins.

“We can’t go on like this,” Cassandra said.

Bridget put her hands on Armitage’s shoulders and sat him down on the couch, then perched at the edge of the coffee table. She took a ball of cotton wool and a bottle of TCP from the shoe box and began to tend to his cut lip. Armitage flinched when she dabbed at it, wiping away the blood, but said nothing.

“What are you going to do?” Phasma said, sitting down between Cassandra and Armitage.

“Do? What _is_ there to do?” Cass said.

“My father is a ruthless bloody factory master, but even he draws the line at behavior like this,” Phasma said. “Your _father_ should lose his position, not Arm.”

“ _No_ ,” Armitage said, wincing. “He’ll turn us out of the house.”

“We can live somewhere else,” Bridget said. She set down the cotton wool and put her hand on his knee. “We’ll manage.”

“Mum, he’ll take it out on you — and Cass, too. Do you think I can let that happen?”

“Armie, what if he hurts you worse next time, though?” Cassandra asked.

“Well, that’s why I’m having that clause added to the trust, isn’t it?” he said, mock-lightly.

“Don’t joke,” Cassandra said, distressed. “Phasma’s right. He deserves to be punished.”

Armitage stood, shakily. Bridget reached out as if to steady him, but he took her hand and pressed it between his palms.

“Don’t do anything just yet. I just want to lie down. Sleep. My head….”

“Armie, you shouldn’t sleep,” Bridget said with a sudden firmness. “You could have a concussion. I’m going to ring the surgery.”

Armitage held onto her hand. “Mater, please. I didn’t black out. I’m fine. A few days rest will sort me out — didn’t you hear the General? Back on the front lines on Monday.”

Cassandra started to stand to follow him upstairs, but Armitage turned back.

“You and Mum eat,” he said. “Maybe bring me some up later? I’m not feeling —”

And then the darkness on the edges of his vision spread inward, until all he saw was a single point of light. He dropped to his knees and then to the floor, and as he heard Cassandra shriek, the blackness that enveloped him reminded him of the pupils of Ben Solo’s eyes, widening as they looked into his as they stood under a tattered awning on a cold, damp night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ben and Armitage haven’t spoken to each other since chapter two! I know. It’s killing me, too. But they will GET THERE, I promise. Next chapter is Cassandra’s, and then… THEN the one after that is Ben’s. Get ready for longing looks and fingertips brushing! I’ll probably do another mood board — this time for Ben.


	8. VIII - Throw Your Homework onto the Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Brendol Hux threatens to reveal damaging information about Ben Solo's past, Cassandra goes to warn Ben. And she meets someone who can help her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is from ["Sheila Take a Bow" by The Smiths](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-8kKH4COvg).

### Chapter 8

#### Throw Your Homework onto the Fire

Phasma managed to get Armitage out of his jacket and onto the sofa while Bridget rang the surgery. Cassandra could hear her, though Bridget turned toward the wall as she spoke. She was pleading for a house call, saying she didn’t know if it was safe to move him.

Cassandra sat on the floor next to the sofa, and the room seemed to spin as she watched Phasma lean over Armitage whispering his name to rouse him. His eyelashes were so pale against his skin, and when they fluttered, Cassandra had never been so happy for anything in her life.

He opened his eyes, and they stayed fixed on the ceiling as he took in deep breaths, and then he slowly put his hands to his temples. He winced as he touched the right side of his head. When he moved as if to sit up, Phasma put her hands on his shoulders.

“Stay put, Arm.”

“Where’s Cass?” he asked. “Where’s Mum?”

“I’m here, Armie,” Cassandra said. “Mum’s just over there. We’re fine. Do you want anything?”

“Water,” he said. “A pillow.”

Cassandra stood immediately and went upstairs for his pillow while Phasma went for water. Armitage was sitting up and sipping when she came back down. She settled the pillow on the sofa and when he lay back down, she sat on the floor next to him.

“You’re such a great sodding bastard,” Cassandra said, sniffling.

“ _Cassandra. Language,_ ” Bridget said, her hand over the mouthpiece of the telephone.

“You wound me, sister,” Armitage said, his voice soft, his eyes closed.

“Why did you have to cross him? I was so scared.”

“I don’t have your talents of deception, Cass. I’m an open book. The General knows what I am, and he’ll torment me with it whether I hide it or not. Best to live in the open.”

“I hope you see now, though, Arm,” Phasma said, “what losing you would do to Cass, would do to your Mum.”

Armitage threw his arm over his eyes. “Can you turn down the lights, please? And what are you talking about?”

“Your stupid bloody writing, Armie!” Cassandra cried. “The sea, the knife — what are you _thinking_ , why can’t you _tell me_ if you feel like that?”

“Cassandra,” Armitage said, shifting his arm so he could look at her, “you’re lucky I’m too shattered to throttle you. Those were _song lyrics_ , you hysterical girl.”

“Don’t call me hysterical. It’s misogynist. And how was I to know?”

“You weren’t to be nicking papers from my room, but that didn’t stop you doing that.”

Cassandra frowned and rested her forehead on the pillow next to Armitage. “I’m sorry. I just was so worried. Also, I hate you.”

* * *

The doctor arrived an hour later.

“Well aren’t you lucky,” she said to Armitage, “all these women fussing over you.”

She was sturdy and solid, with the air of a woman who had been a girl who kept calm and carried on during the war. She asked if it was all right with Armitage for everyone to be in the room when she examined him, and getting his consent, got on with her business. Without saying much, she peered into Armitage’s eyes with a penlight, tested his reflexes, examined the bruise that was spreading from his temple outward. She asked him who the prime minister was, and he grimaced when he answered.

“Well it seems you have your wits about you,” she said. “Now, is there something you should tell the police about how this happened?”

Armitage didn’t answer.

“It’s not my place to tell you what to do. But keep the question in mind.” She turned to Cassandra, Bridget, and Phasma. “Mildly concussed. Ice on the bruising. No aspirin. He can go upstairs to rest if he’s up to it, but he has to stay there if he does. Keep him from talking much or reading or writing or watching the telly or listening to music for the next three days, and then he has to ease back into it. Complete rest for the brain.”

Armitage groaned. “No words or music? Give me a death sentence why don’t you.”

“You’ll follow directions if you want to keep enjoying those things, young man,” the doctor said. “It’s a good job there are three of them watching you.” She gave Bridget her card. “Call me if he has any trouble waking or a worsening headache. But rest and time is what will heal him.”

While Bridget saw the doctor to the door, Cassandra installed herself on the old green armchair.

“I’m staying with you tonight, Armie,” she said.

“No need,” he said. “I just want several hours of oblivion. You can trust me.”

“I don’t though.”

“I’ll stay with him,” said Phasma. “You’ve been sick, Cass. You need rest too. You too, Bridget.”

“Thank you so much, Phasma,” Bridget said. “Armie’s never had a better friend.”

Cassandra nodded. She was honestly too tired to argue, for once. But she didn’t want to sleep. She was sure that every time she closed her eyes, she would see it — Brendol, his fist clenching, his face contorted with disgusted rage. She fought the tears that threatened to begin spilling onto her cheeks again. Fought for strength — for Armitage’s sake.

“Let me help you get him upstairs, then,” she said to Phasma.

“I’ll help her,” Bridget said. Her face was weary as she kneeled on the floor and put her head against her son’s. “My boy,” Cass heard her whisper. “My dear brave boy.”

“Don’t worry, Mum,” he whispered back. “We’ll all get what we deserve in the end.”

He eased himself up to sit, and Phasma and Bridget helped him up. He winced each time he took a stair. Cass waited two steps below him.

“You’re going to milk this for all the drama you can, aren’t you?” she said to him.

“One cannot change one’s nature, Cassandra.”

Once he was in bed and Bridget had given him the lightest of kisses on the top of his head and gone to her room, Armitage turned to his sister.

“Cass, I need you to do something for me. Do you have Ben’s number?”

She shook her head.

“Then first thing tomorrow, will you find him and warn him about what the General knows about him?”

Phasma looked between them. “Do you think what your father said about him is true? Maybe Cassandra shouldn’t be around him.”

“Phasma, you don’t know Ben. He wouldn’t hurt a fly,” Cassandra said. “What our father said was all bluff and bluster. Would Armie send me to talk to him if he thought he was dangerous?”

“I wouldn’t think so, but if I know Arm there may be… other considerations clouding his judgment.”

“Phasma,” Armitage said, cringing, “this is common decency. And Cass is right. He’s not going to hurt her — or anyone.”

“Let me go with you then,” Phasma said to Cassandra.

Armitage shook his head, then hissed in pain. “No, he doesn’t know you. It’ll be better if it was just Cass.”

Phasma looked dubious. “All right, Fitzhuxes. I trust you. Who the bloody hell knows why, but I do.”

* * *

Cassandra checked on Armitage before she headed out for the day. He was awake, lying on his back looking at the ceiling. Phasma lay on her stomach with her arm flung across him, snoring.

“You should be asleep,” Cassandra said. “How do you feel?”

“Strangely enough, like some bully excuse for a man hit me on the side of my head.”

“But Armie….”

His eyes were closed now. “What?”

She breathed deeply. “They weren’t _just_ song lyrics, were they? It’s not something you just made up, that feeling. You just didn’t want to say with Mum there.”

“No, they weren’t,” he said, not opening his eyes. “But once they’re on paper, those kinds of thoughts — instead of having power over me, _I_ have power over _them_. Now go on. The patient needs his rest.”

“But you _can_ tell me, you know,” she said.

“I know. But sometimes… sometimes paper seems to understand more than any person could.”

Cassandra sighed. “Oh, Armie. Anyway, I’ll come back as soon as I tell him, so you don’t worry.”

She turned to go.

“Cass.”

“Yeah?”

“Tell him… Tell Ben I’m sorry.”

Cassandra frowned. “For what?”

“Just tell him that. He’ll understand.”

“All right.”

She closed the door, called goodbye to Bridget, and went out into the sunny dampness of a bright morning after a rain. Her cold wasn’t completely gone and she sniffled in the cool air, drawing her duffle coat tighter around her.

Where to find Ben? He had taken the same bus route home as she had and had stayed on after her. So she boarded the bus in that direction and got off at the next stop, figuring she’d poke about the streets near each stop looking for… something. At the second stop, she saw two young men in tracksuits sitting on the front steps of a terrace house and, despite her trepidation, asked them if they knew a boy named Ben Solo.

“Oh, ay, love, I know him,” said one of them. His hair was clipped short against his skull, his face was leering, pale eyes hard. “Saw him today, in fact.”

Cassandra took a step back and asked, “Really? Where was he?”

The young man grabbed his crotch. “Right here, love. Show him to you if you want.”

The other young man laughed uproariously, showing bad teeth, and the first man joined in, but his eyes stayed on her, cold and ugly.

Cassandra stood rooted with horror for a second, willing herself to run. And then she did run, blindly, the wind against her face pricking where the tears fell. The men’s laughter didn’t follow her, but she still ran. When she finally turned the corner of the block — it had seemed impossibly far away — she wiped at her eyes, still running, and then collided with a woman crossing the sidewalk to a car at the curb. Cassandra fell to the sidewalk.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” Cassandra cried. “I was just running from — and I didn’t see you…”

“Well, that much is apparent, dear,” said the woman. She reached down to help Cassandra stand. “Are you all right? Why were you running?”

The proffered hand had rich brown skin, and Cassandra looked up and saw an older woman. She had a mass of dark brown curly hair, pulled back, with several streaks of silver. She wore a plush camel-colored wool coat and pumps with sensible heels. Her dark brown eyes were honestly concerned, but there was an air of strength around her, a warning not to take her kindness for weakness. It was a wonder that Cassandra hadn’t knocked her down, but she also got the feeling that it would take a lot more than a distraught teenage girl to topple this woman.

“I’m OK,” Cassandra said, taking the woman’s hand and standing. She took stock of her slightly muddy coat and scuffed loafers. “There were just some… some men.”

“Ah. _Men_. Aren’t there always some men.” The woman looked Cassandra over, too, and Cassandra could see that she took note of her school kilt and scarf. “Aren’t you meant to be in school, my dear?”

“Yes,” Cassandra said, “I am. But I need to speak with someone very urgently and it couldn’t wait until after we’re released. But I don’t know where to find him.” She paused. “I don’t suppose _you_ know Ben Solo?”

The woman smiled, unexpectedly, showing strong white teeth. “Luke Skywalker’s nephew? I’ve just come from seeing him and his uncle.”

Cassandra, stunned, didn’t answer.

“I know,” the woman said. “The coincidences that happen for those two are something I’ve stopped trying to understand. Now, my name is Rae Sloane.”

“Please to meet you, Mrs. Sloane.”

“Ms. Sloane, if you please.”

“Oh, yes — I’m sorry. I’m Cassandra. Cassandra Hux.”

The corners of Ms. Sloane’s mouth turned down. “There’s a name I didn’t expect to hear. But, yes, I see it now. That red hair, though yours is blonder than his.”

“You know my father? I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize for your father, Cassandra. He’s none of your doing. But he’s given some trouble to Luke in the past. What’s your business with Ben?”

“He’s… he’s my and my brother’s friend. I really need to tell it just to him, though.”

Ms. Sloane nodded. “I respect your commitment to his privacy, Cassandra. Come with me, I’ll take you to their flat.”

Rae Sloane had been general manager of First Order manufacturing when Brendol Hux was the factory manager, she told Cassandra as they walked.

“It wasn’t easy, exercising authority over someone like Brendol Hux — as I’m sure you can imagine,” Ms. Sloane said. “Especially as a woman — as a _black_ woman. The turnover rate at the factory was eating into efficiency — it probably still is. People just don’t want factory jobs anymore. Your father was so intent on keeping employees that he went to far. That’s how I met Luke — he came to me with his concerns about Brendol coming after some former employees who left to pursue their educations or different opportunities. It was messy for a bit there, but I managed to… well, _smooth things over_. Here we are.”

The building was a glass-and-concrete pseudo-Brutalist tower, almost posh, not like the council estates that clustered at the edges of town.

 _Of course_ , Cassandra thought. _His mother is a senator. That’s a big deal in America, I guess._

The uniformed doorman greeted Ms. Sloane with a smile.

“Back for more already?” he asked, winking.

“Cheeky!” she said. “I’m just showing this young lady up to see her friend. She got a bit lost on the way here.”

“A friend of Ben’s is a friend of mine,” said the doorman. “Go on up.”

“Ben’s a good lad,” Ms. Sloane said as they got on the elevator. “Still finding himself, but there’s an awful lot to find in that head of his. Which I’m sure you’ve figured out.”

“He seems so… open to everything,” Cassandra says. “He’s always interested, like he wants to know all about you, and to tell you everything he’s thinking.”

“And that’s where he gets into trouble. He comes on with everything out in the open. People get swept up, and they’ll do anything for him.”

Cassandra nodded. “Seems like my brother, Armitage, was — _is_ — one of those.”

“Ah, so that’s what — or _whom_ , rather — he’s been moping about. It hits Ben hard on those rare occasions when he doesn’t get what he wants.”

“Armitage is convinced that Ben doesn’t really like him, that he was just using him to promote his music.”

Ms. Sloane laughed, shaking her head. “Your brother,” she said, “must be an idiot.”

“He is,” said Cassandra. “I keep telling him.”

Cassandra wasn’t sure what to expect from Luke Skywalker when she saw him — grizzled beard, long hair, intense blue eyes, bare feet — but when Rae Sloane introduced her, he smiled, his face creasing in smile lines, his eyes lighting up.

“Miss Hux! Well, well, well — famous sister of the famous Armitage! Ben talks about both of you constantly.”

Ben himself came down the hall behind Luke now, holding a radio.

“Uncle Luke, I think I figured out what’s wrong —”

He stopped speaking abruptly when he saw Cassandra, and his face went pale.

“It’s Armitage, isn’t it? Something’s happened to him.”

“No, Armitage is fine — or he will be — but —”

“What do you mean ‘will be’? What happened? It’s your father, isn’t it? He did something.”

Ben’s eyebrows were drawn close together, his large hands around the radio gripped so tight his knuckles were whitening.

 _How could he know?_ Cassandra wondered.

“Slow down, Ben,” Luke said. “Let’s sit down. Cassandra, is it all right if Ms. Sloane joins us? No offense, but she has experience dealing with difficulties that your father has caused.”

“Yes, of course,” Cassandra said, her voice hardly above a whisper.

Ms. Sloane and Cassandra sat on the sofa while Luke sank into a beanbag and Ben simply folded himself up and sat on the floor, cross-legged. Realizing he was still holding the radio, he set it down on the floor. Then he laced his fingers together and put his hands in his lap, as if by some unspoken instruction. He closed his eyes and breathed in and out, slowly.

Luke watched him for a few breaths and then turned to Cassandra. “I think Ben is ready to hear what happened now.”

Cassandra began with what she thought would be most important for Ben and Luke to hear — her father’s threat to reveal Ben’s arrest record and ruin his mother’s political career.

Luke chuckled. “It might be easier for everyone if your mother’s career _were_ ruined, wouldn’t it?”

“She’d just have more time to be disappointed in me,” Ben said. But there was no malice or bitterness in his voice. It was casual, matter-of-fact.

“Now, we’ve _talked_ about this. Leia isn’t _disappointed_ in us, she’s _concerned_.”

“Do you really think it could hurt her, though?” Ben asked. “I don’t want one more thing worrying her.”

Luke patted his nephew on one of his broad shoulders.  “Don’t worry about this, Ben. _I_ will take care of it.”

Ben nodded, and Cassandra was astounded how easily something so potentially catastrophic seemed to be an inconvenient but minor chore to Luke. Was that what it meant to be from a powerful family?

But neither Luke nor Ben had disputed the charges her father had made. Had Ben really done all _that_? She thought of his gentle eyes when she was first getting to know him, of the way he smiled at Armitage and instantly had her brother enraptured. But she also remembered, suddenly, the sudden anger that had blazed in his eyes when she confronted him in the rain. An unsettled queasiness began in her stomach. Her brother couldn’t get involved with someone capable of _that_. What if Ben’s anger turned on Armitage?

Ben turned back to Cassandra and started to fidget with his hands, bending his fingers back and forth until his knuckles cracked. “But what about Armitage? What happened?”

Cassandra looked down at her own hands, the tears that were threatening finally spilling down her face. She hated how easily she cried sometimes, especially when she was angry, but she wasn’t ashamed to cry about her brother.

“Father, he — he got angry because — well, he got angry. And he _hit_ him. I mean Father hit Armitage, not the other way around. Armitage would never.”

Ben moved to stand up, but Luke placed his hand on his shoulder, said softly, “Ben, she’s not done talking. Let her finish.”

“Armitage is going to be fine, but he has a concussion.” Here, Cassandra heard Ben draw in his breath sharply. “He needs to rest — he’s not meant to read, or write, or listen to music — anything he likes, really — for the rest of the week.”

Ben did stand now, and began to pace, his whole body unable to contain its agitation. He clenched and unclenched his hands and then pushed them through his hair.

“I have to see him,” he said. “Cass, do you think he’ll let me see him?”

“Ben, the doctor says he needs to rest. Seeing you will just be… a… a surprise.”

“All right,” Ben said. “All right. But what are you going to do? Did you tell the police?”

“We… I don’t know,” Cassandra said. “I just don’t know. Without father’s help, we’d be destitute. We always have to please him or he’ll… he’ll — we’ll have nothing.”

Ms. Sloane put a tentative hand on Cassandra’s. “Cassandra. This isn’t the first time he’s hurt Armitage, is it?”

Cassandra shook her head. Ben, seeing this, paced more quickly, and Luke got up and put his hands on the sides of his arms, whispering something calming.

“Has he hurt you?” Ms. Sloane asked.

“No,” she whispered. “Never me. Never Mum. He just says… cruel things to us. But he hurts Armie because… because he thinks he’s weak. But he’s not. He’s strong. He’s so, so strong. It’s just that he — well, Father doesn’t approve.”

“Right, well,” Ms, Sloane said. “If you don’t mind, I have a call to pay on Brendol Hux — but only with your blessing, of course, Cassandra.”

Cassandra was somewhat befuddled, but she nodded.

Ms. Sloane picked up her pocketbook from where she’d set it on the floor and took a card from it. “If he hurts _any_ of you again, you’re to ring the police and then me. I may be retired, but I still have influence in Arakanis. And there are laws to protect your mother — to require your father to pay support, at least until you're eighteen. I can help with that, too.”

Cassandra took the card, printed simply with her name, telephone number, and address. “Why? Why are you helping us?”

“Because I detest bullies,” Ms. Sloane said, standing. “And your father is the worst kind — a bigot, a woman-hater. But I know how to handle bullies, and I’ve dealt with his brand of bullying before. I’m so glad I was here to find you, Cassandra. It was quite the lucky thing. Just one of those Skywalker-related happy coincidences, eh, Luke?”

“The Universe has its ways,” Luke said. “Thank you, Ms. Sloane.”

She and Luke put their heads together and spoke softly as they walked to the door.

“I should go, too,” Cassandra said. “I promised Armie I would come right back after I told you.”

“I know I can’t see him, but when you do, please tell him I’m sorry.”

“Oh, that’s funny,” Cassandra exclaimed. “I just remembered — he asked me to say that _he’s_ sorry. He said you’d know what he means.”

Ben didn’t answer. He considered, blinking slowly, looking askance. Then he smiled — the smile that Cassandra knew had captured her brother.

“I do know what he means,” he said. Ben reached out and grabbed her hands, wiggling them. Just like that day in the rain, she was struck by his size — he was more than a head taller than her, his arms strong. But now he seemed gentle once again, playful. “Don’t you see? He means that he knows he was wrong. He means he’ll see me again.”

“I don’t know, Ben,” Cassandra said.

“Why don’t you walk Cassandra to the bus stop and wait with her?” Luke cut in. “I would love for her to have a long visit someday, but she’s right — she needs to get home to reassure her brother.”

Ben nodded and let go of her hands. “All right,” he said. “I’ll get my coat.”

“You did the right thing coming to us,” Luke said, walking her to the front door. He patted her on the shoulder. “Everything’s going to be fine, kid. You’ll see.”

And, somehow, Cassandra believed him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter is Ben's! I was having a bit of trouble getting into Ben's head, but I think I understand my characterization of him now, and I love this poor kid so much. He's just a churning mass of emotion and enthusiasm and restlessness.


	9. IX - When You Cycled By, Here Began All My Dreams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben is supposed to be just walking Cassandra to the bus stop, but he can't stay out of trouble.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New POV, new moodboard!  
> 
> 
> The title of the chapter is from "Back to the Old House" by The Smiths.

### Chapter 9

#### When You Cycled By, Here Began All My Dreams

Ben and Cass walked, heads down, and Ben was lost in his thoughts about Armitage — feeling an anxiety and beneath it a simmering anger that needed some kind of outlet, he knew, or it would reach full boiling. He tried to concentrate on the cracks in the sidewalk, the scraggly weeds growing through them.

 _The Universe has its ways,_ his uncle always said. Life found its way through concrete, and he and Armitage would find their way — through their misunderstandings and through Brendol Hux, through _everything._ Ben was certain.

He snapped to when he saw Cassandra turning up the next street.

“Why are you going that way?” Ben asked Cassandra, impatient. “The stop is one street up — you’ll have to backtrack to get to it.”

“There were some men who hassled me,” Cassandra said, looking at her feet as they walked. “Best to avoid them.”

Ben, loping by her side, scoffed. “Let ‘em try something when I’m with you. We’ll miss the next bus going around that way.”

Ben, without even thinking about it, took her hand to lead her along. He couldn’t help but feel the similarity to Armitage’s hand, the same smooth skin and slender fingers. But Armitage had seemed to welcome his touch, and now Cassandra was trying to pull her hand from his.

“Ben, _no_! I don’t want to go that way!”

He stopped walking and let go of her. “I — I’m sorry, Cass. I wasn’t trying to force you to. I’m just anxious. But you’ll be fine, really. Maybe we can give them a scare, yeah?”

She looked up at him, her green eyes — again, so much like Armitage’s — studying his face. She locked her eyes with his and bit her bottom lip.

“You really did that, didn’t you?” she said. “What my father said you did. Assault. Arson.”

Ben swallowed hard, pushing down the panic and anger that accompanied any thoughts about those times — when he’d lost control.

 _Don’t push it down, envelop it_ , Luke’s voice echoed in his mind. He imagined the light, wrapping it around the core of darkness that his uncle said was part of his being. _It’s part of everyone_ , Luke said, _but it’s strong in you. But you’re the master of it. Remember that, Ben_.

“Ben?”

“Yeah,” he said, putting his hands on his hips, looking down at the pavement. “Yeah, I did that. I’m not proud of it, and I’m lucky I didn’t go to juvie or whatever. Lucky my mom is who she is.”

He knew he wasn’t imagining the slight way Cassandra leaned away from him, wary of him now. He hated it.

“What happened?” she asked. Her voice was small, as if she didn’t want to ask but had to know.

“I’ll tell you, I promise,” Ben said. “But only after I tell Armitage. I just… I wouldn’t hurt you or him, please believe me.”

She blinked up at him, taking him in, he knew — thinking about his size, his strength. Those were things he couldn’t help — but he hoped she could see, too, that he never tried to deceive, that what he seemed to be was truly who he was. Someone who meant no harm, who never hurt anyone on purpose — well, at least not anyone who hadn’t hurt someone else first.

“All right,” she finally said. “And, yeah, let’s give those guys something to hassle.”

She laughed, the mischief-loving Cass he’d known before he saw what her father could do to her.

Ben tipped his head toward her and said quietly, “You go first so they don’t see me.”

“Ben, I don’t want to _invite_ trouble this time — just stay out of it.”

“Trust me,” he said.

“I don’t have a good feeling about this.”

“I won’t let them hurt you,” Ben said. “Remember how you came to me to defend your brother’s honor? Now I’m doing the same for you.”

He felt the familiar restlessness to _do_ something, anything. If he couldn’t confront Brendol Hux for hurting Armitage, he would confront these men.

“It’s not that I’m afraid they’ll hurt _me_ ,” she said. “I’m afraid you’ll hurt _them_.”

“Maybe I will, maybe I won’t,” Ben said. “It depends on them.”

“All right, then.”

Cassandra turned the corner of the men’s street, walking slowly, her hands in the pockets of her coat. Ahead, Ben could see that the men were still on the front steps, playing dice and drinking something out of a bottle. He knew he could trail behind Cassandra without them seeing him. It was just one of those things he could do and couldn’t explain.

 _Focus on her_ , he willed at them.

And they did.

“ _Oy!_ ” one of them yelled. He was sickly looking, his hair and skin almost the same sallow color. “Look, it’s Miss Schoolgirl back for more! I told you where you could find your friend, didn’t I, love? Come give ‘im a kiss!”

“Leave me alone,” Cassandra said.

“Oh, she’s lively, this one,” the other man, said. “Come on, sweetheart, don’t be like that.”

Ben stepped forward now, between them and Cassandra, and he knew that to them it appeared as if he had materialized from the sidewalk. They blinked for a moment.

“So are you gonna leave her alone or what?” Ben said.

The first man laughed. “Oh, so you found your Ben Solo, did you? Met up for a quick shag in the afternoon? Maybe she’s up for more, eh? What do you say, Mr. America?”

Ben wasn’t self-conscious about his American accent; he rather liked the way it marked him out as an outsider. It sometimes made other men underestimate him, despite his size — they assumed he didn’t know the code of the streets of Arkanis, so he was an easy target. He took stock of the two men. They were typical of the rough sort who loitered on front steps and street corners — more scrappy than solid, overconfident when they were drunk. And these two were very drunk.

“You’re going to take that back,” Ben said, standing squarely facing them. “And you’re going to apologize to this young woman.”

They stood, hands already balled into fists.

“And you’re meant to, what? Make us?” said the sallow man, stepping forward.

“I wouldn’t do this if I were you,” Ben said.

The two men glanced at each other and then rushed at Ben, as if to knock him over. Cassandra yelped and stepped back, but Ben _laughed_. He had known what was coming. He held out his hands, elbows slightly bent to absorb the men’s weight as their shoulders barreled into his palms. With a slight push, he sent them to the pavement, sprawled on their backs, the broken surface crunching as they slid over it. The sallow man’s head knocked against the concrete with a hollow thud and he seemed to be stunned, not getting up immediately. The other man, though — he was reaching into his pocket, and Ben knew very well what to expect. These type always resorted to stabbing. The man got to his feet, drawing out the blade.

“ _Ben_ ,” Cassandra said behind him.

But Ben dropped one of his hands, palm toward her. _Wait._

The man lunged at Ben, sloppily. Ben laughed again. Not so much out of ridicule but at the _predictability_ of it all. Instead of stepping back to evade the blow, he sidestepped and grabbed the man by the wrist. He stopped the momentum of the swing effortlessly and then held tightly until the man yelled and dropped the knife.

Ben let him try to pick it up, and then put one big boot on his hand. The man tried to tug it free, but Ben just pressed harder. The screams seemed to recede in the distance to him as he saw the sallow man rise to his knees and then to his feet, then stagger over in a half-hearted attempt to help his friend. Ben simply lifted his leg and pushed him away — not so much a kick as a shove, foot against his stomach. The man fell again, with an _oof_ followed by dry, desperate coughing..

“ _Well?_ ” Ben said to them, still standing on the second man’s hand. “What did I say you were going to do?”

The man under his foot just yelled, so Ben lessened the weight on his hand.

“I take it back,” the man panted.

“What about you?” Ben said to the other man on the ground.

“Yeah, mate, we take it back.”

“ _And?_ ”

“Sorry.”

“ _Not to me_.”

“I’m sorry, miss,” the sallow man said, and the other man echoed him, weakly.

Cassandra looked down at both of them. Ben saw in her eyes the feeling that pervaded him all too often — whether he was punching someone or singing on stage. The feeling of having power over others. But then he saw her do what was so difficult for him — withdraw from it.

“Let’s just go,” she said, putting her hand on his arm.

Ben slowly took his foot off the man’s hand.

* * *

“Did I do something wrong?” Ben asked.

Cassandra walked next to him, her arms folded over her chest. She’d put up her school scarf high around her ears, as if to block herself off from him.

“No,” she said. “I mean… yes? Or — not really wrong, but kind of scary.”

Ben knew this all too well. It was why he was in Arkanis, instead of at home in New York with his parents. He had scared them. He had scared a lot of people.

But Cassandra gave a little hop and started walking backwards, talking animatedly at him.

“It was like you knew what was going to happen before it happened. That’s what was… not _scary_ , just strange. And you didn’t hurt them more than you had to — well, maybe that one bloke's hand is broken, but…” And here, she suddenly burst into tears.

Ben stopped walking. “Hey,” he said. “Hey.”

She launched herself at him, wrapping her arms around him, pushing her wet face into his wool peacoat.

“It’s just that when our father hurts Armie, it’s only out of cruelty. He doesn’t do it to defend anyone or out of a sense of what’s right. He does it because he wants to hurt him. Because he _hates_ him. And I don’t know why! I feel so guilty because I can trick Father, I can make him think I’m the ideal daughter, but Armie can’t hide. And Father just keeps pushing him and pushing him and pushing him and I’m so scared. I’m so scared it’ll go too far.”

Ben put his hands against her back. “You heard Ms. Sloane,” he said. “She’s going to fix it. She helped Uncle Luke before with your father, and she’ll help now.”

“But what if it’s too late? What if he’s hurt Armie too much already?”

Ben’s anger, his hatred, surged forth again. It was visceral. He knew in his whole body that he _had_ to hate Brendol Hux, just as he knew he needed to be near Armitage. That he _would_ be near Armitage. It was just a matter of time.

“It’s never too late,” he said. “Look at me.”

Cassandra let go of him and stepped back to look up at his face. Her eyes, with the thin light coming through the clouds on them, glittered with gold in the green.

“Did your father… Did he hit you?”

“My dad? Nah. He’s a tough-talker, a brawler — hit his fair share of guys who deserved it, but never me. Even when I did deserve it. But… there were... other people.”

Ben’s thoughts grew vague here. Everything — what was around him, his imagined future, his childhood before that time — was usually so clear in his mind. But there, his memory faltered.  His uncle said it was like medieval parchment that had been scraped to be reused. Over time, the old writing would still rise to the surface, faint but discernible — and so it would be with him. He would remember.

“I’m sorry,” said Cassandra.

Ben shrugged. “I can’t be sorry for what made me who I am now, unless I want to be someone different. And I don’t. Come on, bus’ll be at the stop in five minutes.”

They trotted up the street, and Ben held Cassandra’s hand in his — she was like his younger sister too, now, he reasoned, and even thought she was tough and wary and sharp-tongued, he saw too now how vulnerable she was. And he could feel that she appreciated it now. This was something he was learning to do, to use his size, his strength, to make those he cared about feel secure, feel safe.

Not just _feel_ safe, he told himself. They would _be_ safe. He would keep them safe.

But then Cassandra let go of his hand and ran.

“Bus is at the stop already! Bloody thing, it’s early!” she called over her shoulder. Her strawberry blond hair got caught in a gust of wind and her kilt’s hem bounced as waved to him. “Bye, Ben! I’ll come by as soon as Armie’s well enough to visit. Or maybe I’ll even bring him!”

Her words filled Ben with a rush of contentment and he slowed his trot to wave back at her.

And then he remembered why he believed contentment was a lie, and vigilance was the only way of life that was safe.

Because a sleek black car sped past him on the street, sending up a spray of water, and then stopped between Cassandra and the bus. Ben broke into a sprint, his senses instantly sent into a state of alarm. But he couldn’t reach her in time. He was close enough to hear the man who emerged from the backseat say, “Didn’t your father tell you his eyes are everywhere?” as he grabbed her, to hear Cassandra shriek; close enough to see the look of enraged fear in Cassandra’s eyes as she flailed out with her elbows and heels and tried to sink her teeth into the man’s hand that gripped her shoulder.

Ben yelled her name and she looked down the sidewalk at him, just as the man forced her into the car.

“Ben!” she screamed. “Tell Armie! He’ll know —”

And then the man shoved her into the backseat and got in the car after her. The door slammed shut. The car sped off. She was gone.

Ben kept running on the slick, crumbling sidewalk. He put his hands in his hair and clutched at it, letting loose a scream that drew the attention of people on the bus. Almost instantly, though, they turned away, back to the business of rather not getting involved.

There was no time to think — and that was when Ben’s instincts, his feelings about what must be done and how, came into their sharpest strength. Before the bus could pull away, he had wrenched one of the bikes off the rack on its back, swung one long leg over it, and pedaled down the street, so fast that he couldn’t tell if his eyes stung and watered because of the wind or if he was crying.

He didn’t remember that he didn’t know where Armitage’s house was until he was halfway there. He only had to cast out his feelings like a fishing line, and it had hooked onto Armitage’s location, by what means Ben didn’t question, as he didn’t question so much that happened to him. Cassandra had told him _Tell Armie_ , and the Universe showed him the way.

Or at least that’s why his Uncle Luke would say.

 _Uncle Luke_. Ben’s conscious mind cringed as he thought of all the other courses of action he _could_ have taken that probably made more sense — go back to his flat and tell his uncle, who could call Ms. Sloane. Why hadn’t he insisted that Ms. Sloane drive Cassandra back home, for that matter? What if he had walked the way Cassandra wanted to — would she had been able to get on the bus then?

Ben took a turn onto Emperors Street tight and fast, the back tire of the old fixed-gear bike screeching as he squeezed the brakes. He had done what he had done, and there was no choice now but to see it through. He knew this was the right street  — somehow — and he looked down the row of terraced brick houses, seeking out the one where his hook had landed. The number materialized in his mind — a voice or an image, he couldn’t quite tell.

_Three eighty-four. 384._

He glanced at the number on the house he was passing. _One fifty-two._ He pedaled harder.

When he reached the house, he skidded the bike to a stop and practically leaped off it, letting it drop on the street with a clatter. His boots slid in the gravel on the edge of the road as he ran to the door and he stumbled but righted himself before he could fall. He pushed open the metal gate so hard that it slammed against the garden’s brick wall and then pounded on the dark green door.

“Please please please!” he shouted into the wood. Only when the door opened and he saw a tall, blonde young woman — sleepy-looking and wearing a New York Dolls T-shirt on which Ben’s frantic senses picked up the scent of Armitage’s skin — did he realize how he must look. Panting, face running with sweat and tears, the cuffs of his jeans soaked, his long body writhing in his anxiety, big hands balled up, teeth in his bottom lip.

“Ben, isn’t it?” the young woman said, her voice plush but strong. “What are you doing here? Armitage isn’t well enough to see you. Where’s Cassandra?”

With the last question she seemed ready to confront him — and she _could_ , Ben thought, taking in her strong forearms, her height just shy of his own, and her determined expression.

“Her father,” Ben managed in a gasp. “He sent someone to take her — please, can I just see Armitage? She told me he would know.”

“Know what?” Her eyebrows drew together, a line between them.

“That’s all she could say before he put her in the car — _Tell Armie, he’ll know_. You’re Phasma, right? Please, Phasma, can I just talk to him? ”

Before Phasma could answer, the window of the bedroom above the front door slid open.

“Phasma, go ahead and bring him up,” a voice — soft and tired, worried, but unmistakable to Ben — said.

Ben stepped away from the door and saw Armitage’s pale face, looking down through the screen. He realized he was holding his breath as he looked up, a feeling of unsettled eagerness mingling with his fear for Cassandra. He would _see_ him again, he would feel their bodies together in the same space.

“Oy, are you coming in or what?” Phasma snapped from the doorway.

Ben started. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I’m coming.”

He wiped the sweat and tears from his face and dried his hands on the thighs of his jeans. And then he stepped inside after Phasma, mounting the staircase, feeling that unmistakable tug at his heart — Armitage, just up the stairs, just behind the narrow bedroom door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually found Morrissey’s childhood home in Stretford, Manchester on Google Streetview, but I made the rare decision to not be creepy and didn’t use it for the top image in the moodboard. Maybe I'll put it in the footnotes if I get around to doing those.
> 
> I only realized when editing that it speaks to Ben's absolute certainty about Armitage that he doesn't get jealous or suspicious when he sees Phasma, who has obviously been sleeping in Armitage's clothes. He's a boy with certainty, Ben Solo is — it's nice to see him like this, without the divided mind that Snoke's influence produced.
> 
> We're going to stay with Ben's POV in the next chapter for his reunion with Armitage. eeeeeeeeee!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading, kudos, and comments!


	10. X - I’d Leap in Front of a Flying Bullet for You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben finally sees Armitage again, and he makes him a promise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is from ["What Difference Does It Make" by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/XbOx8TyvUmI)

### Chapter 10

#### I’d Jump in Front of a Flying Bullet for You

The house was silent, as if even the air molecules were still. The motes of dust in the sunlight floated in front of Ben’s eyes, and he could pick out each one. He thought of the flecks in Armitage’s eyes. He thought of stars.

He followed Phasma up the stairs.

She opened the door to Armitage’s room slowly.

“All right, Arm?” she asked.

Ben saw the slight movement in the room behind him — Armitage nodding, shifting himself on his bed.

“Come in, then,” Phasma said to Ben.

Ben walked past her into the room, blinking as his eyes adjusted to the dimness. He took it in, the private space of the man whose life he was convinced must intertwine with his — the record player on the floor near the bed, the posters of Oscar Wilde and David Bowie on the walls, the small desk with the typewriter, the stacks of worn Victorian novels — _Tess of the D’Urbervilles_ , _The Mill on the Floss_ , _Wuthering Heights_ — and true crime paperbacks, the tortoiseshell glasses perched on the bedside table next to a composition book and chewed-on pencil. Phasma looked toward Armitage, nodded, and then, unexpectedly, left the room and closed the door behind her.

And only then did Ben really look at Armitage. The sight made him rush to the bed and drop to his knees next to him, instinctively reaching out to touch his face. But he stopped himself just short, so that his long, broad fingertips hovered above the bruise spreading from Armitage’s right temple across his eye and cheekbone, his thumb perilously close to the swollen, split lip.

The mixture of the desire to avenge these hurts and the desire to comfort, to touch was nearly unbearable. Tears sprung to Ben’s eyes and he didn’t stop them welling there and spilling. The two young men were silent as they regarded each other, Armitage reclining against his pillows and Ben wound tight, his whole body taut with potential actions that he knew he couldn’t take. He wanted to embrace Armitage, he wanted to take his hands in his, he wanted to lightly kiss each place where he hurt — he wanted, oh, he wanted _so much_. He couldn’t speak — it was as if the words had tangled in his mind and couldn’t fit through his throat.

“Ben,” Armitage finally whispered, wincing at his own voice. “Cass?”

Ben was suddenly ashamed. Cassandra had been with him, and what had he done? Shown off for her and then let her get snatched off the street. He sank back on his heels and wiped at his eyes. He took a deep breath.

“A man forced her in a car. He said your father has eyes everywhere. I don’t know where he took her. Armitage, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I should have protected her, it’s my fault — I don’t know why I didn’t ask Ms. Sloane to drive her, I shouldn’t have let her run ahead of me, and I didn’t know what to do, so I — I — I came to you. She said to tell you. She said you’d know.”

Armitage’s eyes filled with an expression Ben knew very well from his own reflection. Rage. A pure desire to destroy, to right a wrong through obliteration. That had been the emotion propelling Ben's fists when he struck blindly at his school principal, too lost in his anger to know where they were landing; it had been the fuel that he had poured into the fire that consumed his school.

And because Ben knew what it was to feel that rage, he couldn’t help it now — he put his hand on Armitage’s chest, palm flat, trying to will calm into him.

“Don’t,” Ben said. “Let me.”

Armitage looked down at Ben’s hand where it lay against his heart. Ben felt its beat quicken under his touch and then grow steadier as he held Armitage’s gaze. Their breaths fell into the same rhythm, and after a time, Ben nodded — a question, asking permission. Under his hand, his eyes, Armitage’s body relaxed and he nodded in return.

“He’ll have taken her to his house,” Armitage said. “I’ll give you the address. Phasma can take you.”

“I’m going to call my uncle,” Ben said. “Rae Sloane said she’d help you and Cass, and he’ll know how to reach her.”

“Rae Sloane? She’s the one — I remember my father mentioning her.”

“Then you know you want her on your side.”

Armitage nodded again and reached for his notebook on his bedside table. Ben dropped his hand from Armitage’s chest, instantly missing the warmth, the feeling of life under his palm and fingertips. He steadied his feelings as Armitage wrote down the address for him, closing his eyes, finding the midpoint between his anger and his compassion. His uncle thought that action born out of compassion alone would suffice, but Ben knew he could use his anger — and he would have to use it to confront Brendol Hux.

When he opened his eyes, he saw Armitage’s strained, impatient face.

“Sorry,” said Ben. “I need to get in the right frame of mind so that I don’t just lose it on your father.”

“I don’t care what you have to do,” Armitage said quietly. “Whatever it takes to get her back. I would do it myself if I could.”

His mouth trembled, and Ben wished he could catch his lips in his to stop it, to taste the dried blood, to be gentle where violence had been done. He leaned toward him to take the paper. Armitage grasped his hand, the slender fingers, then the soft palm, slightly damp, closing around it.

“Thank you, Ben.”

Despite everything, Ben smiled, just a slight upturn of his mouth, pressing his lips tightly together as if to hold in the fullness in his chest that Armitage’s touch produced.

“I know this sounds like just another one of the crazy things I say,” Ben said, “but I would do anything for you.”

Armitage’s eyes filled with wonder but then clouded, gray overtaking the green. “Don’t say that. You don’t know what I’d ask you to do.”

“I know you would never ask me to do anything I would say no to,” Ben said.

Armitage shook his head and squeezed Ben’s hand, his thumb running lightly over his palm. Ben shivered, and then realized that Armitage wasn’t withdrawing his hand, that he would be the one to have to let go.

So he said, “I’ll be back with Cass,” and did.

* * *

Ben called Luke from the telephone downstairs, blurting out the whole story of Cassandra’s abduction off the street so quickly that Luke had to make him repeat it all, slowly.

Once he understood what had happened, Luke sounded more more astonished than worried. “That’s brazen, even for Brendol Hux,” he said. “Really, Ben, trouble sure has a way of finding you.”

Ben sighed impatiently, shifting from foot to foot. “Uncle Luke, _I’m_ not the one in trouble — Cass and Armitage are! It’s not about _me_.”

“Hey,” Luke said, “I know. I know. Just don’t do anything stupid, OK? I’m going to call Ms. Sloane now. Let us handle this.”

“No,” Ben said. “No, I have to do something.”

“Ben, the best thing you can do now is stay there and support your friend.”

“No, I promised him.” The heat was rising in his cheeks now, his free hand balling into a fist.

“Ben, listen — this is exactly the kind of thing we’ve been talking about —”

Ben hung up the receiver with a slam that made Phasma start from where she was sitting on the edge of the sofa, obviously anxious.

“All right, Ben?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said, and he noticed that he was breathing hard, his heart thumping. “Yeah, I just…”

Ben closed his eyes, steadied his thoughts. He _knew_. He knew what he had to do, what had to happen. Why couldn’t his uncle see it? Sometimes Ben saw every step he could take laid out before him with such clarity. And even if he _didn’t_ see it, more often he _knew_ that if he did what the invisible force that tugged at his heart, at his limbs, at his mind made him feel he _must_ do, it was the right thing.

“Brendol’s house,” he said to Phasma.

“Yeah?”

“Can you drive me there?”

Phasma stood and picks up her leather jacket from the back of an armchair. “Fuck yes,” she says. “Let’s go.”

* * *

Ben leaned against the door the whole drive over, wanting to burst through it the second they pulled up to Brendol Hux’s house. He felt Phasma looking at him from the corner of her eye, even as she sped down the winding highway into the outer suburbs. It began to rain, but Phasma didn’t slow their pace, taking the curves with the assuredness of someone who has driven them many times.

“All this you’re doing — believe me, I get it,” she finally said, “but you hardly know Arm. I don’t understand how the two of you are so affected by each other. It doesn’t make sense.”

Ben shifted in his seat, trying to settle himself enough to answer. “I know, it doesn’t. But have you ever seen someone and thought they’re beautiful and then touched their hand and known everything you need to know — that they’re the person for you?”

Phasma laughed, a sonorous sound like a church bell. “No, I can’t say that I have.”

“It was like that with him. I don’t know how else to explain it. It’s just how things are with me.” He turned to her. “You don’t think I was trying to use Armitage for my musical career, do you?”

“No,” she said, not hesitating. “I saw the way you were looking at him that night in New Republic. You can’t fake that kind of infatuation.”

Ben sat back, considering. “ _Infatuation_ ,” he repeated.

“Surely you can’t think it more than that at this point?”

“It _will_ be though.”

She shook her head. “I hope you’re as certain of your plan to get Cass as you are about that.”

“What is there to plan? We go there, we knock on the door, we get inside, we find her.”

“Ben, I think it’s going to require a bit more _finesse_ than that.”

“Your father is Scyre Sterling, right?”

“Yeah, why?”

“My mother is Leia Organa — she’s one of the senators for the state of New York.”

“That’s a big deal in America?”

“Yeah, a big deal — she’s one of only a hundred of them, and she’s the first woman from our state. But she’s not like the American Margaret Thatcher or anything like that.” Ben shifted in his seat again, trying to arrange his long legs comfortably in the small car. Phasma was nearly as tall as he was, and yet she sat in the driver's’ seat with unconcerned grace. “But, yeah, people like our parents — they know how to do all that _finesse_ stuff, how to work a room, talk your way into getting what you want. And I guess I have some of that too, when I perform my music — I got that from my mom. You heard me play, right? What did you think?”

He immediately thought how inappropriate it was, in this moment, to ask that question. But like so much of what Ben Solo said, it was out before he could take it back.

“I thought it was…” Phasma did hesitate now, her wrists draped over the steering wheel, the zippers on the sleeves of her leather jacket swaying. “It was _incandescent_. You were like a light, and the people in the audience were moths.”

“You really thought that?”

“I did, but I’m not the one who said it first. That was Armitage, in one of his misery mopes when he was pining for you, or the idea of you, or whatever it is he says.”

A thrill ran through Ben and he let it fuel him. On the one hand, the thought of Armitage in any kind of distress — the thought of him _miserable_ — filled him with a kind of distress and regret. All these weeks — they could have been happy together. Ben longed for it, he longed for Armitage. On the other, Armitage had longed for him, too, and that was enough to give him hope.

His mind raced as his thoughts turned back to Cassandra.

Luke had taught him: Interrogate each thought. Lay it out as simply as possible, without words if it’s possible, and ask yourself: _True or not true?_

Cassandra had come to him to _help_ him, and that’s why this had happened.

_True._

His uncle was right — trouble followed him.

Also true: He could fight back against whatever trouble _did_ follow him. He had fought this far — come across an ocean and turned his anger into music and found a boy whose eyes he had looked into as if gazing into the future.

Those were the eyes he thought of as he stepped out of Phasma’s car onto Brendol Hux’s gravel driveway.

Ben, who has been raised in a stately Manhattan brownstone and vacationed in the Hamptons, could not be cowed by the Tudor-style brick house. It was inelegant, too squat, too obviously built-to-order to look older than it was. It had something resembling a tower, with a comical, conical roof, at the farthest end from the car. Ben caught movement in the third floor window, a slight shifting of the white curtains.

“She’s there,” Ben said to Phasma, who followed his gaze. He paused before he strode to the front door. “You don’t have to come with me, you know. If it’ll make trouble with your dad.”

Phasma smirked. “If my dad hears of this, he’ll throw Brendol Hux from the roof of the First Order factory himself. Best to remind Mr. Hux of that.”

They went to the heavy oak door together. Ben took note of the tire marks in the gravel — they were new, not yet muddy or filled with water. Ben slammed down the brass knocker. He shifted from foot to foot impatiently in the few seconds it took for someone to come to it, to slide open the deadbolt, turn the knob.

He was ready to push past whoever was behind the door, but he drew back in surprise when it proved to be an elderly South Asian woman in a plain gray dress — a housekeeper, evidently. And behind her, a drawn, gray-faced woman, dark-haired and wearing the kind of heavy double-knit fabric dress and heavy, clip-on gold earrings that Ben associated with politicians’ wives. The kind of women who made pointed remarks at his mother, about how brave she was to relinquish her responsibilities as a wife and mother to be a senator.

“Oh, my, is this Philippa Sterling?” the woman said, stepping forward with a forced light air. “To what do we owe the pleasure, my dear? Your father is well, I hope.”

Phasma stopped Ben from speaking with a slight pressure on his arm. And here, despite her leather jacket and pointed boots, she became the scion of an old family that she was, smiling warmly.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Hux,” she said. “My father sends his regards, of course. I’m here to call on Cassandra.”

The woman’s face froze in an expression of feigned confusion. “Cassandra? I’m afraid you must be mistaken. Brendol’s… children live in town, with their mother. And of course the girl— Cassandra — would be in school at this hour.”

She couldn’t hide the disdain that crossed her face, and Ben wanted to step forward, demand to know where Cassandra was, to yell what he had seen in Armitage’s bedroom. To tell this woman what kind of monster her husband was.

But of course she knew that already. Ben settled back into his skin as he realized that.

“Oh, she must not be here yet. This is Ben Solo, Mrs. Hux. His mother is Senator Leia Organa.”

And here they paused, ludicrously, to nod and shake hands, and say “pleased to meet you.”

“Cassandra visited Ben this morning,” Phasma continued, placidly, as if there were nothing odd about this situation, “and he said someone in Mr. Hux’s employ picked her up — we supposed that they were going to have a bit of a surprise father-daughter day. Maybe they had to stop for something on the way. May we come in to wait for them?”

Phasma smiled ingeniously. _Of course_ , Ben thought. _Mrs. Hux can’t refuse — Phasma's father owns First Order Manufacturing. My mother is a senator._

And though she pressed her thin lips together, drawn in so carefully in frosted rose lipstick, Mrs. Hux did indeed step to one side and let them in. She frowned as they tracked water on the veined marble floor, and gave Ben a none-too-subtle up-and-down look, from the top of his shaggy dark head to the toes of his wet boots. Ben noticed this, but taking his cue from Phasma, he put on his best senator’s son manners.

“Thank you for inviting us in,” Ben said, even though she’d done no such thing. He tried not to let his hands fidget, tried not to look up the broad staircase of rich, brown wood. But he followed them mentally. Cassandra would be on the third floor, to the right. Or was there a separate staircase for the round room at the far side of the house? “It’s so wet out, as usual — you think I’d be used it after four years here, but they say only native Arkunians ever do.”

“Of course, I wouldn’t leave you out in such a downpour!” Mrs. Hux exclaimed.

 _But you would_ , Ben thought.

“Please, come sit down in the library. There’s a fire there. Parmila will take your coats.”

Parmila, the housekeeper, obligingly outstretched her arms. Ben wiggled out of his peacoat, though he wished he could keep it on. He liked that coat, and if they had to run out in a hurry with Cassandra he’d have to leave it behind.

The library was a perfect facsimile of a room in an English country manor — wood paneled walls, leather wing chairs, brocade footstools, a wall of serious-looking books. None of them with broken spines, Ben noticed. He sat at the edge of the chair. Not only did he feel completely out of place in this room — too large, too awkward, too American — he was wild with anxiety, his body telling him, as it so often did, to _do_ something. Rage through the corridors of the house, seeking out the door to the room where Cassandra was, put his fist through the man who had pulled her off the street, if he was here.

“What did you need to speak to Cassandra so urgently about that you would come all this way?” Mrs. Hux asked.

Ben’s mind scrambled to come up with something, but Phasma answered with barely a pause.

“She left her school bag at Ben’s flat,” she said. “Oh, dear, Ben, did you leave it in the car? No matter, we’ll retrieve it when she gets here.”

Mrs. Hux’s brow wrinkled slightly. “Her school bag? But I could have sworn she had it —” Her eyes widened in alarm as she caught herself. “She _would have_ no use for it until tomorrow.”

“We stopped in at her school to pick up her schoolwork for her, too,” Ben put in, catching up. “She’s such a good student, you know — she’ll want it.”

“Indeed,” Mrs. Hux said sourly.

Phasma made a show of shivering. “Oh, my, that fire is nice after being out in that cursed rain. The only thing that could be better is to be warmed from the inside out.”

She smiled significantly at Mrs. Hux.

“Would you like tea?” Mrs. Hux said after a moment of awkward silence.

“Yes, please! How kind of you to offer,” Phasma said. “Earl Gray if you have it. And if it isn’t too much trouble, biscuits? I’m afraid my tummy is accustomed to elevenses, and I turn into an absolute _horror_ if I don't eat.”

Ben marveled as Mrs. Hux rose, murmuring that she’d speak to Parmila.

“You needn’t look so shocked,” Phasma said. “‘Learn to wear your power lightly,’ was my father’s lesson.” She stood. “Now, quick — she’ll have gone out the way we came, but there’s another door behind you. I’ll make the excuse that you’ve gone to the loo if she comes back.”

Ben was on his feet in an instant. He hadn’t noticed the door, but he crossed the parquet floor straight to it now. It opened onto a round room, some kind of smoking lounge with stone walls hung with tapestries and more leather chairs, and a large round wooden table with cigar boxes and decanter half-full of amber liquid on it. On the other side — a staircase. Ben nearly tripped on the fringe of an Oriental rug as he rushed over it, but managed to mount the stairs.

As he got to the first landing, where there was another door, he heard a shout from above, and then a thud as if someone hitting the wall, and then a voice that was definitely Cassandra’s half-yelling, half-crying, “ _Fuck you! Fuck you!_ ”

He ran up the last flight, and when he was almost at the top, Cassandra emerged from the door, slamming it shut behind her. She didn’t look injured, but her hair had slipped from its ribbon and flew around her face and one of her knee socks pooled around her ankle. She looked at Ben with wide eyes, holding the door closed as someone on the other side tried to pull it open, yelling, “Don’t think you can get away, you little tart! Where you gonna go, hunh?”

Without speaking, Ben ran to her and grabbed onto the doorknob.

“When I say, run,” he said to her. “Phasma is here. Out the front door to her car. Ready?”

Cassandra nodded frantically.

“Go!”

Ben released the doorknob, and the man on the other side stumbled backward and fell as the door suddenly gave way. Ben and Cassandra ran down the stairs, but Cassandra paused in the smoking room at the bottom, looking around. And then with a scream, she pushed over the round table, sending the decanter crashing to the flagstone floor and shattering it, scattering the cigars. These, she deliberately trod on as they ran out of the room, filling the air with the scent of crushed tobacco.

Once they were through the door into the library, Ben pushed a credenza in front of it. The door opened into the smoking room, but it would still be an obstacle.

Phasma was ready with her keys in hand and they streaked out of the library. Parmila was coming in with a tray, and Cassandra cried out, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” as she nearly collided with her and made her drop it — teapot and cups and plate of biscuits clattering onto the wood floor.

Mrs. Hux, behind Parmila, tried to turn her surprise on seeing them fleeing the library into befuddlement at seeing Cassandra. “Cassandra, my dear, I didn’t know you were —”

“Oh, _stuff it_ , Maratelle,” Phasma said, “you lying, dried-out old sow.”

Mrs. Hux gasped and they all rushed past her, sliding on the marble floor of the foyer — the front door just ahead of them. But as they burst through it onto the gravel driveway, there was a sleek black car pulled up, the driver holding a umbrella as the passenger side door opened. And there, in a greatcoat and fedora, face instantly reddening upon seeing the ragtag group emerging from his house, was Brendol Hux himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the a bit-longer-than-usual wait! This chapter made some trouble for me! I always find Ben's PoV difficult.
> 
> I didn't mean for there to be a blatant contrast between Armitage's stacks of well-read books and Brendol's for-show library -- I only noticed it while I was editing. It's nice when your brain does work for you without you even noticing!
> 
> I went with "Arkunian" because people from Manchester are "Mancunian."


	11. XI - The Boy with the Thorn in His Side

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben confronts Brendol Hux and discovers a power he didn't know he had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is from ["The Boy with the Thorn in His Side" by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/qdOHPjMzY8s) \-- key lyric: "The boy with the thorn in his side, beneath the hatred there lies a murderous desire for love."

### Chapter 11

#### The Boy with the Thorn in His Side

Ben didn’t make the conscious decision to barrel into Brendol Hux. His body was coiled to spring, and seeing Brendol there was the release. His shoulder hit the older man in the gut, doubling him over before knocking him backwards into the car. Ben was barely aware of the words he was saying — screaming, really. He heard them as if from faraway, with Phasma’s and Cassandra’s voices calling his name in a strange, wind-tunnel kind of echo.

“ _I will beat your fucking face into the ground for hurting him,_ ” faraway Ben Solo yelled.

His hand was pressed on Brendol’s cheek, turning his head to the side, pushing it into the seat, pinning him down.

Brendol seemed to be making sounds, but Ben couldn’t hear them. He tried to push Ben off, but his right arm was pinned beneath him, and the other flopped uselessly against Ben’s shoulder at an awkward angle. His legs flailed.

Ben wasn’t sure how much time passed — it must have been seconds, only — before the driver and the other man tried to pull him off. He pushed his weight back into them, sending them stumbling backward. They recovered and grabbed each of his arms, wrenching him away from the car. Ben was still yelling, incomprehensible even to himself, kicking his legs to push the men off balance. They stumbled again and, this time, fell. Ben landed atop them, and Phasma ran over. She held out a hand to him, he took it and hauled him to his feet. He kept his eyes on the men on the ground, who were scrambling to stand in the gravel, but Phasma gripped his arm and held him back with her other arm across his chest to keep him from going after them again.

“You’re _strong_ ,” Ben said, coming back to himself but still trying to make sense of the situation he was in.

“Yeah, yeah — we have to leave. _Now_ ,” Phasma said.

“Philippa Sterling,” Brendol said behind them, his voice implacable. He’d stood and was smoothing down his rain-spattered coat. The imprint of Ben’s hand was on his left cheek in blotchy red. “I can’t imagine your father would be happy you’re in the company of someone like Ben Solo — who not only has a history of violence but who also has just _assaulted_ me.”

Phasma narrowed her eyes, the bright blue shining in the gloomy light. “ _My father_ ,” she said, her tone measured, her accent clipped and precise, “will not be happy to learn that you abducted your own daughter and locked her up in a tower like a ridiculous panto baddie.”

Brendol flinched slightly but his face almost instantly returned to its arrogant indifference. His driver and the other man came and stood by his side. Ben tensed, but Phasma held onto him tighter.

“He’ll understand protecting one’s daughter from corrupting influences, I’m sure. And once he knows about Ben Solo’s _criminal_ history, he’ll not want you associating with him, either.”

Phasma scoffed.

“Daddy, Ben is a good person,” Cassandra cut in, stepping between him and Phasma and her father. “He’s been a really good friend to me and Armie and —”

“No one is speaking to you, Cassandra,” Brendol said, fixing her briefly with a glare.

“That doesn’t mean I’m not allowed to say something!” Cassandra burst out. Her cheeks were flushed and the rain was plastering down her hair. “I was _there_ every time you hurt Armie, _every time_. And you deserve far worse than what Ben did to you! _You_ deserve to be hurt. You’re a _monster._ I wish I could do what you deserve to you _myself_.”

She was crying, her fists balled up, her eyes full of anger and hurt. Ben turned to her, and Phasma loosened her grip on him. He walked over to Cassandra.

“Cass,” he whispered and reached for her shoulder.

“He’s a monster, Ben,” she seethed. “You should do to him what he deserves.”

“Cass, no. I shouldn’t have —”

“You should have!” she yelled. “You should have done worse!”

Phasma came up behind them. “Let’s just go,” she whispered. “Before someone calls —”

She broke off as another car drove up the driveway. Ben recognized the driver and passenger: Rae Sloane and his uncle. Brendol turned at the sound of tires on the gravel and then smiled a close-lipped, cruel smile.

“Oh, so you’ve brought in reinforcements?” he asked Ben. “‘Called in the cavalry,’ as you Americans say.”

“What the fuck — we don’t say that,” Ben said confusedly, unthinkingly.

Brendol’s upper lip curled. Ben started as he realized that he’d seen something akin to that expression — on Armitage’s mouth, a certain indifferent superiority as he described the performance of a band he hadn’t been impressed with. It made Ben feel all the more fiercely protective — he couldn’t let Armitage become like this man. Ben knew what that was, the gift and curse of a lineage — his mother’s and his uncle’s gifts of empathy and influence were only part of it. There was _their_ father, a shadowy figure whose photograph sat on the mantel in the New York brownstone. Anakin Knightley was young in the picture, with an intense gaze that Ben recognized in the mirror. Anakin had gone somewhere that no one would say  and become _something_ that no one would say either — his mother had even changed her last name, using that of her godparents’, to distance herself from him. Sometimes Ben’s grandmother would look at him, and he could _tell_ she was thinking of her absent husband, seeing him in their grandson. Ben couldn’t help that, but he _could_ help Armitage from becoming his own father.

Luke’s eyes met Ben’s at that moment and communicated a thought: _You can’t save everyone, Ben. You can’t save the world._

And Ben’s look said back, _I can try._

Luke and Rae Sloane were out of the car, walking slowly, deliberately, both of them now looking at Brendol with an assuredness that Ben could see unmoored him.

“Miss Sloane,” Brendol said coldly. “I suppose I can guess at the reason for your visit.”

“ _Ms._ Sloane,” she corrected him. “I thought I would never have to cross your path again, Brendol. From what I’m seeing here, there doesn’t seem to be anything to contradict what I already know. You had your daughter snatched off the street and held against her will.”

“Yes,” Brendol said, his voice quiet, “ _my_ daughter. _My_ daughter to do what _I_ want with. She’s a minor and her moral education is my responsibility.”

“ _Moral_ education?” Cassandra yelled, breaking away from Phasma and Ben. “From a so-called man who calls the mother of his children a whore, who beats his son?”

Brendol’s cold eyes turned toward Cassandra again. “Girl, you need to learn to _be quiet_.”

Something in his tone, in the odd, passionless gleam of his look made a chill run up Ben’s spine, the skin on his forearms pucker into goosebumps. He stepped in front of Cassandra, turning his back to Brendol.

“Cass, ignore him. Let my uncle and Ms. Sloane take care of this. Let’s get in Phasma’s car.”

She nodded and took his hands in hers and squeezed.

“Cassandra, take your hands off that disgusting reprobate, or I’ll take them off myself.”

Again, that tone: so coldly sure of his authority, his entitlement to being obeyed. Ben’s limbs went cold and the color drained from his vision. He held Cassandra’s hands more tightly, feeling his body coil up once more, as he watched her fine, light eyebrows draw together in concern, her eyes plead, her mouth form the shape of his name. She tried to pull him back toward her as he whipped around to face Brendol, but the rage — like the one he’d known at his school when he was fourteen, like he knew when he walked out of Brendol Hux’s house and came face to face with the man for the first time — propelled him. But this time, each action was deliberate — the placement of his feet, the narrowing of his eyes — he felt the left one twitch as he concentrated — the extension of his right arm, the opening of his hand, palm out, fingers slightly bent and outspread.

He heard each word he spoke clearly, aware of the deep resonance of his own voice, the way he could use it to command attention, command — something more: “ _You will not touch her_.”

Brendol went rigid, as if a cold stiletto blade had been pressed between his ribs. His eyes widened, the blue irises that were so haughty a moment before now a thin line of silver around pupils blown wide, full of a mounting terror. His hands rose slowly to his throat as his face reddened, and then — Luke shouted “ _Ben_!” — Brendol rose off the gravel until the toes of his oxfords dragged as Ben turned his hand, curling his fingers toward him as if pulling the man in. No, not _as if_. It was exactly what he _was_ doing.

Behind him, Phasma gasped, and Cassandra joined his uncle in shouting his name.

She reached for his outstretched arm but stopped short of touching him. “Ben, Ben, what are you doing? _What are you doing?_ ”

Tears were mingling with rain on her cheeks, but her fear wasn’t _of_ Ben but _for_ him — even this he could feel clearly, as clear as each raindrop falling seemed, as clear as each pebble of the gravel that Brendol’s shoes scraped against.

Luke swept in front of Ben before Brendol could be dragged any farther.

“Ben,” he said, and his blue eyes were warm, full of concern; his long hair straggled down by the rain, his voice calming. “Ben, let him go.”

Ben looked over Luke’s shoulder at Brendol. His face was purple now, his eyes bulging as he clawed at his throat.

“No, Uncle Luke,” he said, and this time it was not the voice he had used to command Brendol. It wavered, it trembled along with his lips. “No, he hurt Armitage. He was going to hurt Cass. I can’t let him. I have to stop him.”

“You will,” Luke said. “But not like this.”

Cassandra finally put her hand down on Ben’s arm. “Ben, I know what I said, but please _stop_. _Stop_.” Her voice began plaintively but firmed as she pressed her hand down, lowering his arm. “You can’t let yourself do this.”

Ben took in a long, shuddering breath, then dropped his hand, letting his arm go slack. At the same moment, Brendol fell to the gravel, gasping feebly, still clutching his throat. Ben looked around wildly in the rain, seeing that Brendol’s two men were pressed against the brick of the house now; that Rae Sloane stood near her car, hands raised to her face, covering her mouth; that the front door was opening, and then Maratelle Hux was running out, screaming.

As she ran to Brendol and kneeled in the gravel, screaming words that Ben couldn’t make sense of, he collapsed into Luke’s arms. His tall frame bent over his uncle’s, but somehow Luke supported him. Ben drove his face into Luke’s shoulder, sobbing, while Luke’s hands held up his shaking body.

“Uncle Luke, did I — I did it again — I ruin everything — they’ll — they’ll —”

“Ssshhh,” Luke soothed. “I’m here, OK? I’m not going to let anyone take you away. Now go. Get Cassandra back home. Ms. Sloane and I will take care of everything here.”

Cassandra came over, nudging her way into hugging Ben, too.

“Thank you, Ben,” she said. “You did a good thing, helping me. Everybody will see that.”

She tugged at his hand, an anxious eye on her father. Ben glanced over at Brendol and saw he was now sitting up with Maratelle’s help. His eyes widened as he saw Ben.

“Idiots!” he tried to bark at the two men, but his voice was dry and thin, and he winced in pain, raising his hand to his throat. “Restrain him. Police.”

The two men looked at Brendol, then at Ben, meeting his gaze— there was a kind of primal awe and terror in their eyes. Ben thought it must be the kind of feeling that inspired humans to worship animals like giant prehistoric bear he had once seen a model of at the Museum of Natural History back home. The men did not move. Ben supposed he should feel strong, powerful. But he didn’t. He felt inhuman, monstrous.

Once again, Luke stepped between his nephew and Brendol. He motioned behind his back for the trio to leave. Ben felt Cassandra’s much smaller hand in his, tugging at him, and so with a last look back, he obeyed and ran to Phasma’s car.

Luke stood over Brendol, and Rae Sloane came to stand by Luke’s side. Neither of them were physically imposing — Ben was half a foot taller than his uncle — but then their shadows were cast on Brendol by a sudden slant of light cutting through the clouds, making them seem to loom over him. Ben knew from experience that Luke’s eyes were now piercing, and that any attempt to retreat from what they accused would fail.

As they reached Phasma’s car, though, the voice he heard was Rae Sloane’s: “Brendol, what kind of bloody fucking mess have you made now?”

* * *

Ben stuffed himself into the backseat so he could sit with Cassandra. She wiped away the fog on the window to see what was happening in the driveway as they pulled away.

“What do you think they’re going to do?” she asked.

“If I know my uncle, he’s going to make him feel really, really guilty,” Ben said, allowing himself a small smile, to reassure her. “Ms. Sloane, I don’t know. She has so much influence in Arkanis. She can make anything she threatens him with happen.”

“I suppose pilloring him in the public square is too much to ask for? Or exile? Could she have him exiled?” Cassandra smiled back as she pushed her hair off her face, but Ben saw that her hand trembled.

“Hey. You OK?” he asked, knowing she was not OK, even when she shakily nodded her head.

“Nobody hurt me, really. I saw you pull up, and then I kicked that… that… bloody _henchman_ in the bollocks first chance I got.”

She was quiet, and then Ben realized that she was laughing, silently. The laugh rose to her throat and she put her hand over her mouth. Ben’s and Phasma’s eyes met in the rearview mirror.

“Cass?” Phasma asked. “All right?”

“It’s just that —” She tried to stop laughing, breathing slowly. “Sorry. It’s just that it’s all so ludicrous! Henchman, imprisonment, like something out of a bloody fairy tale. And when you called him a ‘ _panto baddie_ ,’ Phasma! Oh, lord, his face!”

Phasma joined in Cassandra’s laughter, and Cassandra gasped out impressions of her father, blustering with her chest puffed out about “my daughter’s moral education.”

“Oh, and, Ben, when you said ‘ _What the fuck, we don’t say that_ ’ — oh la!” She leaned on his shoulder, letting out a peal of giggles.

“Stop, Cass!” Phasma said. “I have to drive!”

Ben looked from one to the other, befuddled. He couldn’t find it in himself to laugh. His hands were clutching his knees, and a litany of _hurry hurry hurry_ ran through his head. Armitage was at home, hurt and worried, needing to see that his sister was safe. And then it came back to him: Brendol’s face as an unseen hand closed around his throat, lifted him, and pulled him across the ground. Ben turned his hands over now, looking at them, rotating them slowly back and forth.

Cassandra and Phasm had gone quiet, and he knew they were remembering too. It was as if all three of their minds had closed to the experience for a time — unable to process the inexplicable.

“How did you do that?” Cassandra asked, not needing to explain what she meant.

Ben shook his head. “I don’t know.” He pressed his palms to his temples. “I have to talk to my uncle about it, but I don’t think he knows either.”

“Could you have… killed him? Would you have done?”

Ben tried to determine whether Cassandra was afraid or merely curious. A bit of both. He could sense that her value of her father’s life was in the abstract — a value for life in general, a transactional interest in his payment of her tuition, his ownership of the house she and her family lived in. But beyond that — not even hatred. Loathing of his presence, but what she mostly felt was  indifference for him as individual. The fear was for Armitage’s sake. Her desire to protect him was fierce, sharp.

He shook his head, not to say no, but to try to drive Cassandra’s thoughts out, not wanting his own abilities just then. They felt like a violation, a way of trying to find the right answer instead of the _true_ one.

“Yes,” he said, terrified at his own certainty. “I would have.”

But Cassandra nodded. “When he hurt Armie, I would have killed him. But I’m glad I couldn’t and that you didn’t. For our own sakes, not his.”

Ben noted the anger welling in his chest once again when Cassandra mentioned Brendol hurting Armitage. _Notice the emotion, name the emotion, find the origin of the emotion, understand the emotion_ — more of Luke’s words, another strategy to keep Ben from losing control. As he had done when he had choked Brendol Hux without even touching him.

Or _was_ that a loss of control? He had never felt more in command of anything than he had in that moment — his desires turned into action just by his thoughts. It had taken a great deal of effort, but somehow he had known just how to use it, how to direct it.

He realized he was exhausted. He peered out the window, through the blur of raindrops on the glass, at the scraggly trees bordering the motorway. In twenty minutes, Cassandra would be reunited with Armitage. Ben could picture her collapsing into his arms in his dim little room, Armitage’s relieved tears.

But he couldn’t picture himself. How would Armitage respond to _him_? The anticipation overwhelmed him, but didn’t let himself hope.


	12. XII - Does the Body Rule the Mind or Does the Mind Rule the Body?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Run, Armie, run.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is from "Still Ill" by The Smiths.

### Chapter 12

#### Does the Body Rule the Mind or Does the Mind Rule the Body?

Armitage slept on and off, feeling like he was drowning in darkness whether awake or asleep. His head throbbed, even in his dreams, which were murky — barely-formed images of Cassandra’s annoyed expression as she turned to him at New Republic when he wanted to leave, a vague feeling of Ben’s presence, muffled snatches of music.

Sound coming from the front garden below his window woke him, and he winced as he sat upright too quickly. Cassandra was back — Ben and Phasma had saved her, and they were going to all tromp up the stairs and she’d run to him and put her arms around him and call him Armie, the way he hated so much.

But the rattling at the doorknob made Armitage suck in his breath. There was no sound of a key, no sound of Cassandra saying, “Oh, la, I’m being so bloody clumsy right now!” or Phasma’s low, musical voice; no prickling sensation of Ben being near him. He rose from his bed and looked down from the gap between the curtain and the edge of the window. It was cloudy outside, but the light was still blindingly painful. Armitage forced himself to open his eyes.

There were two men below, wearing dark suits. One was balding, light reflecting off his scalp. Armitage wasn’t sure, but he thought he’d seen them before — security at the First Order factory, maybe, on that first day when he and Phasma had gotten booted out of orientation. For perhaps the first time in his life, he cursed himself for not paying enough attention to people besides himself.

In any case, after having tried the door and finding it locked, they seemed to be discussing what they should do, the bald man gesticulating. Through the thin glass, Armitage caught a phrase: _the boss_.

His father, of course. The boss couldn’t be anyone else but Brendol Hux.

In a series of increasingly painful actions, Armitage found a pair of shoes under his bed, snatched his duffle coat off the peg on the back of his door, and left his room. When he got out onto the landing, he heard muffled voices through the door. And then, making him start so badly he almost fell on the first stair, there was a knock on the door — a firm rapping at first, a pause, then heavier thumps.

His feet felt like stone, his head even heavier, but Armitage forced himself to take each stair, dragging his shoulder against the wall as he braced himself up. By the time he got to the bottom, the knocking on the door had become pounding. He forced himself into a near-run, his body protesting against it, moving clumsily. He kept his eyes on the entry to the kitchen — the back door was there, and, beyond that, somehow — escape. His thigh hit the corner of the old sofa as he edged past it into the kitchen, making him stumble and catch himself with his hand braced on the door jamb. His mother’s teacup from that morning was still in the kitchen sink. The men outside tried another round of pounding on the door, making it rattle on its hinges. Armitage used the noise to cover the sound of him scrambling to the back door and opening in it.

The cold air and gray light hit him like another blow, the pain spreading from his temple and settling into a dull, intense throb at the base of his skull. But he didn’t have time to recover from it — he just ran blindly for the back garden fence, his shoes sticking a bit in the mud.

The fence was shoulder-high, the metal mesh cold and clammy to the touch, like the skin of some kind of sickly, armored beast. Armitage’s hand slipped on the fence’s top bar as he tried to haul himself over, but he closed his hand around it again before he could fall. He pictured Ben’s large, strong hands, the calluses on his fingertips, his long legs. Ben would be able to vault over these fences, he was certain.

 _Stop it_ , he told himself. _Run._

There was a low shed of sorts, the kind where people kept garden rakes and shovels, on the other side of the fence. Armitage landed gratefully on top of it, and then slid off onto the patchy grass in his neighbors’ garden. There was a rusty tricycle there, overturned, a pair of gardening gloves hanging over the handlebar like eerie, deflated hands. It occurred to Armitage that noticing details like that wasn’t relevant or appropriate. He had to keep his mind on the fence on the other side of this garden. If he could just get over a few fences and then back onto the sidewalk, he could reach the Blue Bridge, the pedestrian walkway that led over the railroad tracks and into the sedate, tree-lined streets of the neighborhood where Cassandra’s school was.

But Emperors Street was long and straight, and if he went out onto the sidewalk, his father’s men would see him if they looked up the street. Armitage would have to deal with that when it came to it. He ran for the next fence.

This one was wooden and harder to get over than the metal one, with nowhere for his feet to get purchase. The top beam was smooth at least, worn by time and weather. He almost toppled over but managed to turn himself foot-first. The garden on the other side was paved, and he landed hard, rattling his teeth and sending a shock of pain behind his eyes. This time he _did_ fall, with another jolt as his knees hit the concrete. For a moment, he considered simply lying down on the ground and sleeping, waiting for someone to find him there, a pile of empty clothes like the gardening gloves. It could be safe. He searched his memory for who lived in this house, a double, with two families. Was it the Bangladeshi family who might take his being in their back garden as a threat, some bigot set on terrifying them out of the neighborhood? Or was it the old widower, a military man who once said that Armitage’s hair “would have never passed muster during the war”?

Armitage stood up, brushing the gravel that had stuck in the heels of his palms on his trousers. He realized then that he was in his pajamas underneath his duffle coat and there was a hole at his knee, the skin under it scraped raw.

“Bollocks,” he muttered.

There was no time to dwell on it. He shambled to the next fence. This one had a crate of some sort next to it, and he stepped onto it. But the wood splintered under his weight and he fell through. A large splinter of the rotting wood scraped his right leg, from his ankle up his calf.

He stood for a moment, leaning his forehead against the fence as he laughed to himself at the utter absurdity of his situation.

 _All this_ , he thinks, _because of a boy I’ve only spoken to twice before today._

The pain in his leg — and he was sure he felt blood trickling down to his ankle — slightly distracted from the pain in his head, but both seemed distant in way that worried him. He was going to pass out again if he kept this up. But he knew he had to get to St. Mary’s. He would be safe there. The nuns, in their formidable black habits would protect him. He pictured them brandishing their rosary beads like flails, ready to go into combat.

 _You’re getting delirious_ , he told himself. _Keep moving._

He went over the fence just as he heard voices from his house’s garden and sucked in his breath. They’d gone around the back to check the back door. If they had looked in the right direction, they could have seen him, an awkward figure in pajamas and a black coat nearly falling over a fence.

The wind picked up just then, and carried some words to him:  “Kid’s supposed to be injured, he can’t have gotten far.”

They were in the back garden, so now was his chance. He was about to slip down the side of the house, when the other man spoke.

“...wait here until the girl gets back.”

Armitage sunk to the ground, his feet sliding on gravel as the world spun around him and the pain began to throb in his head again. There was a sound — or not quite a sound but still something he’d call a roar — in his ears, filling his mind so he couldn’t think. He shook it off. Cassandra would arrive home, and those men would be there. He couldn’t let it happen.

He filled his lungs with cold Arkanis air, then fell to all fours and vomited up the toast and tea he’d had for breakfast onto his neighbors’ garden path. For a moment he panted, realizing why the sudden nausea had taken him. He had a plan.

_Bollocks._

Shakily, Armitage got to his feet. He stood a head above the top of the fence, and he could just see the men’s heads as they paced and smoked in his back garden. He took another breath in.

“ _Oy_!” he yelled over the fence tops. “Are you looking for someone?”

The two men looked over, and Armitage didn’t pause to see what they did next. He ran. Up the side of the house and onto the sidewalk. His head filled with more pressure with every stride, but he knew he couldn’t stop, even as the world began to blur, even as it began to rain again. He heard the voices and footsteps of the men, four houses behind him, but he didn’t look back.

It was three blocks to the Blue Bridge, over the tracks, then down the tree-lined path, and through the roundabout to St. Mary’s Secondary School for Girls.

So he _ran_. Armitage was a good runner. He had experience with this route, too much— though in the opposite direction from what he was taking now. The secondary school where he’d gone was just up the street from St. Mary’s — Arkanis Academy, a grim set of gray edifices, its halls smelling of gym socks and restless cruelty, where Armitage learned that if he couldn’t hide in the storage room among the boxes of bunting and the caretaker’s mop or behind the hedge, pressed up against the back wall of the auditorium, then he had to _run_.

And he knew how to slow down his pursuers, too. He pushed over a metal bin that was in a driveway behind him, ran recklessly in front of a car that would block their path as he crossed a side street. One more street to cross, then half a block more. He gulped down the air, fighting another wave of nausea. It began to rain, heavily, and water streamed through his hair onto his face. He couldn’t wipe it away. He had to keep moving, as fast as he could.

The pain hammered in his head every time his feet hit the pavement, and he was starting to shiver, his body overheated from running and chilled by the rain at the same time. But there it was, the bridge — metal stairs led up to it switching back three times. He ascended them, not slowing, the clang of metal reverberating up his legs into his jaw, making his teeth rattle.

Armitage didn’t want to lose them on the bridge, though. He needed to draw them away from the house for as long as he could, hoping that Ben and Phasma would arrive with Cassandra while the men were chasing him. They’d see the car and know not to go in, to drive on to someplace else. He hoped, he hoped. Or maybe Ben would rush out of the car, ready to take on whomever he found. Armitage could picture him doing that, all impulse and righteous rage.

But he couldn’t stop to think about that. Right now, all he could do was run, and hope the two men kept running after him. He had never before wished that whoever was chasing him would keep chasing him.

Armitage reached the top of the stairs, and the length of the Blue Bridge stretched out in front of him, dizzyingly. It was a concrete path, the corrugated metal sides painted what someone must have supposed was a cheery shade of blue, the color of the sky in some place other than Arkanis.

He heard the clang of men’s feet falling on the metal stairs and put his head down. A train was crossing the tracks below. The sound filled Armitage’s ears, and the old thoughts — _Over the side, a step and it’s over_ — filled his mind. But he didn’t want to do that then, and he didn’t now.

The rain continued to come down hard, and Armitage’s feet splashed in the puddles that formed in the uneven pavement. His pajama trousers clung wetly to his calves, and he could feel where the blood on his right leg was adhering the fabric to his skin. The men reached the top of the stairs and had a clear view of him now on the straight stretch to the stairs on the opposite side. They didn’t bother to call out to him — they just kept running, too.

Armitage kept his eyes on the end of the bridge, just a few more yards now. And now down the stairs, where the men _did_ call out to him.

“What are you running for? Your father just wants a word with you, that’s all!”

Armitage managed to scoff as he ran, blowing water off his lips. Even when his father was “just” talking to him, he never was doing only that. For Brendol, words were just a way to wound. Armitage knew how to do that too, did so every week in his column when he took apart bands that offended him with their mediocrity. But in his mind he heard Ben in his room saying, “ _Let me_ ” and “ _I would do anything for you,_ ” and then he thought of what a solace words could be, too, how much they could say if they were the right ones and you let them slip into your mind and become part of you.

Armitage was at the stairs now, and he descended them quickly and lengthened his stride as he got on the straight path. The trees partially sheltered him from the rain, and he wiped the water from his eyes, just then noticing that not all of it was rain.

The men were gaining on him as he energy flagged, but there was a small roundabout at the end of the path, and Armitage knew the rhythm of the traffic well enough to dodge the cars and run straight through. He thought of Ben, how he moved through the crowd at New Republic without so much as brushing shoulders with anyone. He took a ragged breath in and made the leap.

A cacophony of honking horns and yelling bloomed behind him as he crossed the center and then the other side of the roundabout, as if propelled by the chaos. He stumbled on the curb but ran on. St. Mary’s was just a few yards away.

He arrived at the front steps, panting, then doubled over, and heaved, holding onto the metal railing. His retching brought up nothing but bile and his stomach cramped so violently that he almost fell to his knees. But he kept hold of the railing and hauled himself up. There were three sets of stairs to the door. He glanced behind him and saw the men extricating themselves from the confusion of cars in the roundabout. But he knew with a shaky peace that he was safe now. Once he was inside, the two men, his father, First Order Manufacturing — everything that was keeping him from Ben and menacing Cassandra — wouldn’t be able to touch him. At least for a little while.

Armitage staggered inside, breathing heavily, then tried somewhat pathetically to tidy up his hair and clothes. He’d not had time to button his coat before he left, so he did up the toggles now, to hide as much of his pajamas as he could.

The kindly-enough older nun who worked in the the office — Sister Ann? Agnes? — Armitage couldn’t remember — peered over her reading glasses, the arms of which were tucked under her wimple, at him as he stood at the office counter. Her face grew concerned as she took in his bedraggled state. He was grateful that she couldn’t see his bloodied pajama bottoms.

“Armitage?” she said. “Are you all right? Has something happened to Cassandra?”

“No — yes — I mean.” He hadn’t thought of what he was going to say. His thoughts lurched through the pain in his head, but after a moment of doing what he could only assume was gaping, he finally came up with a reason for his presence at Cassandra’s school.  “I’ve been ill, and I went outside to get some fresh air and accidentally locked myself out. I’ve come to get the key from Cass.”

Sister Ann-Agnes frowned. “You mean she isn’t at home? She’s absent from school today.”

Armitage tried to look surprised and worried. “That’s strange.”

Sister Ann-Agnes sighed and practically rolled her eyes. “You and I both know that it is _not_ strange for Cassandra not to be at school when she should be.”

“Yes, well — can I use your phone? I’ll ring my mother and let her know. Maybe Cass is — maybe our father —”

 _Bollocks_. The room, already blurry thanks to Armitage having left his glasses on his nightstand, was beginning to sway. He gripped the edge of the counter and tried to focus on its pale turquoise surface, the little sparkling flecks in the formica.

Sister Ann-Agnes stood. “Armitage? I think perhaps you should go lie down in the nurse’s office.” She reached across the counter and put her hand on one of his. “You’re ice cold! Let’s get you dry, shall we?”

Armitage nodded, and water dripped from his hair onto the counter. “Yes, but — I need to tell Cass — she shouldn’t….”

Sister Ann-Agnes came around the counter. She was tiny, like a little nesting doll in her black habit, and came only up to Armitage’s shoulder, but she put her arm firmly around him and shepherded him toward the back of the office.

“I will ring your mother at work and find out about Cassandra. You just — goodness, you’re bleeding! Armitage Hux, you’ve gotten yourself into some kind of predicament beyond being ill!”

But then her gaze shifted from him to the front door of the school. Armitage turned, almost falling as his vision failed to follow his body’s movement. The two men were outside, seemingly unwilling to cross the threshold of the school, as if they were vampires, waiting to be invited in.

“Who are those men?” Sister Ann-Agnes asked, suspicious. “You know, don’t you?”

“Perhaps,” Armitage said weakly, “perhaps get me to the nurse’s office? Then stall them… they can’t — stall them and have someone ring the police. They’re… they chased me.”

Armitage managed to stay on his feet until Sister Ann-Agnes got him onto the cot in the nurse’s office. Then he immediately collapsed, aware of the smell of the wet wool of his coat and his hair soaking the tiny pillow, but unable to do anything about it. All he could do was squeeze his eyes shut and hope — or wish — or, ludicrously, beyond all reason, somehow _transmit_ to Ben: _Tell Cass she needs to go to school. I’m here. I’m here, Ben._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song "Still Ill" references "the iron bridge," a real structure in Manchester that Morrissey crossed every day going to and from secondary school. I turned it into the Blue Bridge in this chapter and placed Cassandra's school where his was.


	13. XIII - You Know Where You Belong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Phasma, Cass, and Ben find Armitage; Ben can't quite handle it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is from "These Things Take Time" by The Smiths.

### Chapter 13

#### You Know Where You Belong

Phasma’s little car slipped down the wet streets, which were quiet this time of day, and everyone in the car had gone quiet too. Cassandra felt herself closing in, the details of what had happened to her becoming more stark the farther she got away from them. The man’s hand around her arm, the look on Ben’s face as he ran toward her, her absolute rage at being forced into the car and held in place as it sped away.

“Don’t scream, love,” the man driving had said, “we’re just taking you to your father. Nothing to scream about.”

And she had spat out, “Obviously you don’t know my father very well,” and the two men had laughed ugly, knowing laughs.

“Oh, you sound like your father’s daughter all right.” the man who was keeping her in the backseat said, leering. “But you got your mother’s looks, except for the hair, didn’t you? Lucky for you he’s your father.”

Cassandra had squared her jaw and shoulders and looked him the eye. “Lucky why? Are you insinuating that something would happen if I _weren’t_ my father’s daughter? Because if you are, I shall be sure to inform him of your _concern_.”

But the two men had just laughed again in response, and Cassandra had devoted all of her energy to keeping her wits, keeping calm. She imagined herself Miss Fitzhux, the haughty heroine of a Georgian melodrama — destined to rise above her station, like Becky Sharp, but with a more sympathetic author.

When they arrived at the house, her father’s wife, Maratelle, opened the door herself. Her thin lips were pressed tight together, the lipstick line of them barely visible.

“Cassandra,” she had said, as if summoning up more words would have pained her in some way

So Cassandra summoned up Miss Fitzhux once more and answered, “Thank you for receiving me into your home, Mrs. Hux,” which produced a befuddled expression that Cassandra put into her reserve of strength — for whatever this ordeal was going to be.

Maratelle nodded at the two men, and they bustled Cassandra through the library and the study, then up two flights of stairs. The room at the top of the little tower was decorated as if for a girl ten years Cassandra’s junior — ruffled duvet and window valance, flower-sprigged wallpaper, porcelain dolls in frilly dresses lined up on a white dressing table. The decor filled her with a horror that had made her press herself against the wall next to the door, unwilling to venture any further into the room. She thought of the door they had passed on the second floor. Was that a room for Armitage, done up with model airplanes and toy soldiers?

Cassandra shuddered just thinking of it, and Ben quickly turned to her, as if her smallest movement set off alarms in his brain. Maybe they did.

“Are you OK?” he asked softly.

Ben put his hand on her arm, but so differently from how her father’s man had. For a moment, Cassandra was afraid she would start crying again, but instead, she just slumped back in the seat and covered her eyes with the heels of her palms.

“I just want to see Armie,” she said. “I need to talk to him. I don’t think — I don’t think I can talk about some of this to anyone else.”

“I understand,” Ben said. “Or at least I think I do.”

When Cassandra lowered her hands and put them on her lap, Ben reached out for them. One of his hands was big enough to encompass both of hers, and the warmth and weight of it was soothing, safe. How to reconcile that with what she had seen Ben do to her father? But that hadn’t been his hands. He hadn’t even touched Brendol. Cassandra looked through the water on the window to avoid the image of Brendol clutching at his throat, his face reddening.

“Don’t be afraid of me,” Ben said. “I don’t want you to think I would ever hurt you — or Armitage. I know you’re afraid for him.”

Cassandra didn’t know what to say. She wasn’t exactly afraid of Ben. It was more that she was afraid that someday there _would_ be a reason to be afraid of him. Armitage had already dealt with too much anger and violence in his life to have more of it directed at him. Ben seemed head over heels, true — but what was that based on? A couple of meetings and some kind of invisible connection that Ben believed in. But still.

So she said, “I know you really care about him.”

Ben nodded. “I know it’s hard to understand, but I just _feel_ it. And you’re the reason we met.”

“I’ll have you know, I was on the roof when he spotted you,” Phasma said from the front seat. “And I told him to talk to you.”

“There you go! It’s like… you’re our guides.”

Phasma let out a musical laugh. “Don’t get ahead of yourself, big boy. I’m not here to usher your destiny into being.”

“Oh, no, that’s not…” Ben trailed off, going quiet for a moment and then turning to Cassandra. “Do you feel that?”

“Feel what?”

Ben squeezed her hand, almost too tightly. She wanted to snatch it away, but something about the urgency of his grip told her that it was important, this contact.

And then she felt it — fear, worry, desperation. It was for her. And it wasn’t Ben’s, it was coming from something — _someone_ — else.

“Armitage,” she said.

“You see?” Ben said excitedly. “I told you, we have this connection — I can feel what he’s feeling and —”

“Shut it!” Cassandra yelled, instantly regretting it when she saw Ben’s chastened look. “I’m sorry. I’m just trying to make sense of… I feel like I shouldn’t go home. But why? I want to see Armie, and that’s where — oh!”

Ben responded by pressing her hand with his.

“Unless that’s _not_ where he is now,” she finished. “Where is he?”

Ben shook his head. “I don’t know. You would know better than I do.”

“Where would he go?” Phasma asked now. “If he had to get away from home, maybe somewhere safer?”

“Safer? You don’t think he’s in danger, do you?”

“I hope not,” Phasma said, “but if your father could have someone grab you on the street, what might he do to Arm?”

“Armie’s not well.” Cassandra pushed down the sob that was rising in her throat and squeezed her eyes shut, trying to concentrate on just her brother, feeling her way toward him the way Ben seemed to be able to. “He couldn’t have gone far.”

A flash — a memory of a route walked thousands of times or a vision, she didn’t know. But there it was, the long stretch of the Blue Bridge, its high corrugated metal sides both gaudy and shabby against the gray Arkanis sky.

“My school,” she said. She thought she would have to look to Ben for confirmation, but she was sure of it. “He’s at my school.”

Phasma nodded and immediately took a turn, changing their route to go over the train tracks.

Next to her, Ben gave a little sniff of what was almost laughter.

“What?” Cassandra asked.

“It makes sense that he’d go to your school,” he said. “Besides that it’s close and they know him there. The nuns, the girls who are students. He feels safe with women. Look at everyone he trusts — you, your mother, Phasma.”

“It’s no wonder,” Cassandra said, “what with our father. And the teachers, the other boys at his school… they were cruel.”

“No wonder he thought the worst of me,” Ben said.

Cassandra huffed with impatience. “Ben, I know you go about believing that you’re special and different, and your uncle and everyone else around you believes it too, and maybe you are — but can you see for bloody once that this isn’t about _you_?” Two spots of heat bloomed in her cheeks and spread up to her temples, which began to throb. “It may seem like it, but it’s _not_. All this started before you ever were even in Arkanis. This is about Armie, about _our family_. He’s hurt and scared, and he’s an idiot, so he needs me.”

Under his dark hair, the tips of Ben’s ears reddened. He bowed his head.

“Yeah,” Ben said. “Yeah, you’re right. I’m sorry. Not about Armitage being an idiot, I mean — but the rest of it, yeah.”

“I think I know my brother better than you,” Cassandra snapped, “and I assure you, he _is_ an idiot.”

Ben, in spite of everything, laughed. Cassandra watched him warily, trying to reconcile this grinning boy with the one who could have killed her father and who, apparently, had burnt his school down.

“You know I don’t really mean _idiot_ ,” she said. “Armie is just… he’s _different_ , you know? Phasma, you know what I mean.”

“He’s so sure of who he is yet terrified of _being_ that — and terrified of losing it, too,” Phasma said from the front seat.

“Exactly,” Cassandra said. “And he just blunders along even though he thinks too much.”

Ben was silent for a moment. “I think he’s stronger than you think.”

Cassandra sighed impatiently again, “Of _course_ he’s strong! But you don’t understand — he’s trying all the time not to be our father. He could be, you know — turn cynical and cold and so arrogant that he thinks other people are just props in his life.” Cassandra thought of the room decorated for her in her father’s house and goosebumps rose on her arms. “I just want to see him, the big, skinny dummy.”

“Yeah, me too,” said Ben.

“We’re almost there,” Phasma said.

When they pulled up to the school, Cassandra was scrambling out practically before the car even stopped moving. Then she was running up the stairs to her school, the rain pelting down on her head — running towards, instead away. Ben followed her — she could hear his footsteps splashing on the wet sidewalk, and then she heard Phasma’s join his, but she didn’t turn around to look.

She skidded into the school, and without looking up, Sister Magdalene said, “Ah, Miss Hux. Your brother is in the infirmary.”

Only when Ben and Phasma burst in did Sister Magdalene avert her attention from the papers she was sorting.

“Who is all this?” she asked.

Cassandra called out, “They’re with me!” over her shoulder as she ran down the corridor.

“I’m sorry, you’re going to have to fill out guest passes to come in,” Sister Magdalene was saying as Cassandra left earshot and crossed into the infirmary.

Armitage was lying on the cot, asleep. His clothes and hair were wet, and he had an arm thrown over his face to keep the fluorescent lights out of his eyes. The bruise on his temple had turned an aubergine sort of purple and there was blood on his torn pajama bottoms. Cassandra kneeled next to the cot, not wanting to wake him but also wanting him to know that he wasn’t alone.

“Armie,” she whispered.

He shifted his arm and turned his head, slowly, to look at her. “Cass,” he said. “You’re safe. You found me.”

Armitage tried to sit up, but Cassandra shook her head and put her hand on his shoulder to keep him down.

“Armie, you absolute ass, what have you done now?”

“Let’s see,” he said, turning to look at the ceiling. “I climbed three fences, cut my leg open, ran a mile, and was sick twice.”

“ _Why?_ ”

“Ah, well, a couple of our dear pater’s First Order goons paid a call, even though it’s known that I don’t receive visitors on Tuesday afternoons. They chased me.” His voice was quiet, hoarse — telling more about how he felt than his lightly-thrown words.

Cassandra began to tremble, hating herself for it. . She remembered Armitage coming in from school, out of breath, drenched in rain, never confessing why he was running. For exercise, he said. To get home earlier so he could do his homework and still have time to read George Eliot novels. But she and their mother knew why he ran, and why he didn’t want to tell them why he ran.

“They were going to take you away, too. Armie, there’s something really strange going on. Not just strange. _Sinister_.”

Armitage gave her a wobbly smile. “You know how I feel about that word, as a left-handed individual.”

“Be serious.”

He breathed in deeply. “What did he do to you, Cass?” He scooted over on the cot. “Sit here.”

Cassandra sat down on the cot but shook her head. “They didn’t hurt me, but, Armie….” She closed her eyes. “Later. I can’t do it here.”

Armitage covered his eyes with his arm again, but with his other hand he reached for hers and, finding it, squeezed it.

“Where _is_ the nurse?" she asked, seeing the abrasions on his knuckles. "You’re all scraped up, and your leg….”

“Sister Ann-Agnes said she was coming. The police, too.”

“The police said the nurse was coming?”

“No, you dunce. The police are coming.”

“Oh,” Cassandra said, looking at her hands. “I’m not keen on going over… all that. Wait, who is Sister Ann-Agnes? You mean Sister Magdalene?”

“Magdalene! That’s the name.” He sighed. “I’m surprised you risk her wrath by skiving off school, Cass. The First Order men — the ones chasing me — they turned tail as soon as they saw her.”

A sudden coldness came over Cassandra that immediately heightened to a sticky kind of anxiety. “Armie,” Cassandra said.

“What?”

“Phasma is here. So is Ben. Something happened that I want to tell you about before you see him — but the police might ask about it too, if they go talk to Father.”

Armitaged groaned. “I don’t want him seeing me like this, anyway. But I have to thank him and Phasma for getting you back.”

“They’ll understand that you need to rest.”

Cassandra went back out into the corridor. Phasma was leaning against a wall of lockers, but Ben was pacing fitfully, his hands thrust in his pockets, his hair dripping onto the linoleum. He stopped and looked up at Cassandra. His eyebrows were drawn together in worry and his shoulders rose and fell with each breath he took.

“Armie’s not ready to see anyone,” Cassandra said. “The police are coming to talk to him about two men who came to the house and then chased him.”

Ben’s eyes turned bright and hard. “Sent by your father?”

“Who _else_ would have done? Ben,” she added when she saw that his cheeks were reddening, “don’t let it get to you. You’d better go home and find out what your uncle thinks you should do. You… you attacked my father, and he’s not one to let that go.”

Ben gave her a beseeching look. “But can’t I —”

“Armie wants to rest.”

“Is he hurt? Will he be OK? Cass, I just want to make sure — I want to talk to him!”

The padlocks on the lockers behind him began rattling against the doors, picking up speed until they were swinging from side to side. Cassandra stepped back toward the infirmary.

“Ben, are you doing that?” The sound of metal scraping on metal was almost unbearable.

Ben put his hands on the sides of his head, lacing his fingers at the crown. “I’m sorry, I’m just — I can’t….”

Phasma locked eyes with Cassandra.  “Go stay with Arm,” she said. “I’ll get Ben out of here and then come back for you.”

Cassandra nodded and moved slowly over to Ben. She put her hand on his shoulder. He groaned, his teeth clenched, but the padlocks slowly stilled, swaying from the momentum.

“Armie will see you when he’s ready,” she said. “Please just go home. I’ll call you, all right?”

“Yeah,” he said, lowering his hands. “Yeah, OK.”

Impulsively, Cassandra threw her arms around Ben’s torso and rested her cheek on his chest. There was something about being near him — he invited it with his openness, and it felt safe, calming, even though he was so full of emotions that his body could literally not hold them all. She thought of how unfair it was that she was the one who was feeling his warmth like this, hoping Armitage would know what it was like. But would Ben ever feel as safe to Armitage as he did to her? Ben stood with his arms at his sides for a moment and then put them around her.

“I was so scared,” she whispered.

“I know,” he whispered back. “So was I.”

Just then, the bell rang and girls poured out of the classrooms into the hall. Most flowed around Ben and Cassandra, but she saw two of them pause and look at them, then whisper to each other. They’d been at all-ages night, Cassandra realized. She let go of Ben and backed away. He and Phasma turned and wound their way through the stream of girls in their school uniforms. Ben never even brushed shoulders with any of them as Cassandra watched him walk away, a head taller than the girls around him.

When she returned to the infirmary, the nurse was cleaning the wound on Armitage’s leg.

“I’ll clean this up and disinfect it, but it’s probably going to need stitches,” the nurse said to Armitage, who winced as she peeled away the fabric of his pajamas that the drying blood had adhered to the cut.

Once the nurse had finished bandaging him and had gone to speak to Sister Magdalene, Armitage sat up and rubbed his hands through his still-damp ginger hair.

“Are they gone?” he asked.

“Yeah. Phasma took Ben home and she’ll be back to come get us.” Cassandra sat down next to him and leaned her head onto his shoulder. “What happens now?”

“I’ll tell the police what happened. Phone Mum. Get my leg stitched up. And then we wait, I suppose.”

“Ben’s uncle was there. And Ms. Sloane, who used to be the general manager at First Order.”

“At Father’s house?”

“Yeah. Ben called them before he and Phasma came to get me. Ben thinks they’ll sort everything out. But — Ben, he…” She turned her head so her forehead rested on his shoulder. “And even just now, he — oh, Armie, I can’t even…. And just look at the state of you — it’s all so much.”

She began crying, quietly but deeply. Armitage bent his head over hers and his tears fell into her hair. Up until now, Cassandra had gone through life like a juggernaut — if she did what she wanted, if she didn’t stop to think, then what Brendol did to them wouldn’t matter; she would roll right through it, over it, without it affecting her. But this — she hadn’t been able to run away from it and pull Armitage along with her, as she usually did. This time, their father had hurt them both and they would have to help each other get up again.

And then there was Ben, their unexpected ally in this fight, who had also been its catalyst. How could Cassandra explain the inexplicable to Armitage? To describe what she could hardly believe she saw? She was like her own namesake, a prophecy on her lips — but it wasn’t others who disbelieved her; she doubted herself, an emotion that was entirely new and frightening to her. If Armitage didn’t have Cassandra Victoria Hux, the girl who never let well enough alone, but instead had to lend his strength to this new iteration who was shivering and unsure — who did he have, then?


	14. XIV - I Can't Help the Way I Feel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage returns home to recover and meets Ben's Uncle Luke.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the erratic posting schedule! I've been experimenting with posting chapters as I finish them to keep me accountable. It means I'm writing quickly, but not like clockwork. Thanks for sticking with it!
> 
> The title of this chapter is from "Is It Really So Strange?" by The Smiths. (A little joke about the nuns: "I left the North again/I traveled South again/ And I got confused - I killed a nun/ I CAN'T HELP THE WAY I FEEL")

### Chapter 14

#### I Can't Help the Way I Feel

The constable who came to St. Mary’s took the descriptions of the men from Armitage, but Armitage didn’t mention their connection to First Order Manufacturing. Cassandra still hadn’t explained what the police might have wanted to know about what happened at Brendol’s house, but she told him it was best not to get their father involved. Sister Magdalene insisted that he ring his mother at work — she hadn’t been able to reach Bridget to inquire about Cassandra’s absence. Armitage managed to get by with his story about locking himself out of the house and assuring her that he was fine.

Sister Magdalene fixed him in a disapproving stare when he replaced the receiver. “Sins of omission, Mr. Hux,” she said.

“Sister, my mother has enough to worry about. I’m sure I don’t want to tell her over the phone that her son has been pursued by villains whilst in his pajamas. I won’t fail to fill her in on the details tonight, I promise.”

Sister Magdalene raised her eyebrows. “How many details do you manage to keep from her with that silver tongue and roguish look, I wonder,” she said.

Armitage realized he quite liked Sister Magdalene. “I couldn’t have a better compliment,” he said, and she waved him back to the infirmary.

Cassandra, without an excuse she could use, had to go to her classes, and Armitage was allowed to doze on the cot with the lights dimmed until Phasma came to pick them up. The nurse, whose name was _actually_ Sister Ann, brought him a lunch tray from the cafeteria.

“We don’t get boys to fuss over here,” she said as Armitage ate a wiggly mound of custard, ignoring the roast. “That’s the nice thing about you lot sometimes — you let us take care of you. I used to work in a primary school, and that was the best part. The girls in secondary, they want to prove that they don’t need us. You already know _that_ about your sister. But — secret —” She smiled and Armitage realized that she was quite young, just a few years older than he was. “She needs you more than you might think.”

Armitage nodded and then set down the lunch tray to lie down once again. When he woke, Cassandra and Phasma were standing over him.

“Come on then, old thing.” Phasma said. “Haul up, we’re going.”

Armitage blinked into half-wakefulness. “We can’t go back to my house. They’ll come back.”

“We’ve taken care of that,” Phasma said. “I’ll be there — and so will Ben’s uncle and Ms. Sloane. And don’t worry — your mother knows they’ll be there, but we left it for you and Cassandra to tell her everything that happened.”

“We have a whole posse — or whatever Americans call it — to protect us!” Cassandra said, laughing.

Armitage sat up with Phasma’s help. “What about Ben?” he said softly. “I want to thank him.”

“He wasn’t sure if he should come,” Phasma said.

“I’ll call and tell him to come with his uncle, if you want,” Cassandra said.

“Yes,” he said, averting his eyes, a blush rising in his cheeks. “I’d like him to be there.”

“Armie,” Cassandra said. “Remember what I said, though — I have to tell you something… something about Ben.”

She and Phasma exchanged an anxious look.

“What is it?”

“After we get you settled at home.”

The halls had already cleared of most of the students when they left, Armitage leaning on Phasma for support. His leg where it was cut throbbed and he limped as he walked.

“I’m supposed to get that stitched up,” he said.

“Well, guess what?” Phasma said. “The multi-talented Luke Skywalker said he’d do it.”

Armitage gave her a more-than-dubious look.

“He was a medic in the war before he became a guru or whatever it is,” Phasma said.

“War?” Armitage said.

“Vietnam.”

“Oh.” Still, he was uneasy. “But isn’t this why we have the NHS?”

“Look,” Cassandra said. “Luke and Ms. Sloane are arranging everything so that our father doesn’t call the cops on Ben — he’d have to admit to kidnapping me to do that, anyway, but Ben would still be in trouble. If you go to hospital, it might not be like the house call — they might ask questions about your concussion, the bruises.”

“What do you mean, they ‘arranged everything’?” Armitage asked.

“Ms. Sloane talked to my father, too,” Phasma said, “and Brendol is going to be out at First Order, but they’ll put out the story that he’s retiring — as long as he turns over his entire severance package to your mother.”

They were outside now, in the cool air and dimming light. Armitage breathed in deeply.

“All of it,” he said.

“Yes — and he’s going to sign the house over to her,” Cassandra said.

Armitage could hear the elation, but also the caution in her voice, as if she weren’t ready to believe it would happen. He was dizzy momentarily — all this done for them — why? While he slept, a cadre of people who surrounded Ben had rearranged his life. He was grateful, but there was also something else — his head hurt too much to interrogate it, though.

He sat with his head against the window of the passenger seat on the ride home, the cold glass pressing against his bruised temple. It was a short drive, but he had fallen asleep again by the time they reached home. It was a dreamlike walk back up to his room, the place where he had last seen Ben — just this morning, but it seemed like so long ago — when Ben had put his big hand on Armitage’s chest, and Armitage had said “Get her back,” and Ben had said, “I’d do anything for you.”

Armitage sank into his bed, thinking of it, in submission to a heady swoon that had nothing to do with his injuries. He couldn’t quite believe it had happened, but he could still feel the warmth of Ben’s hand — it had almost covered his chest entirely, with that broad palm and long fingers. He had held that hand — at New Republic three weeks ago. Later, he told himself that the warmth and safety of it had been an illusion. But then he had held it again this morning, and it had been the same — the reassurance of that touch, the belief that Ben meant what he said, could do what he said.

Ben had gotten Cassandra back.

But here, in the familiar quiet of his room — where his glasses still rested on the nightstand and the book he had been reading before he had gotten the concussion, _Jude the Obscure_ by Thomas Hardy, and next to it John Donne’s _Meditations_ , lay on the floor — he could think about what what he felt besides gratitude.

It wasn’t quite resentment, not toward everyone who had helped him — but a certain disapproval in himself. What had he done besides run? What had he _ever_ done besides run? He thought of what Cassandra had said, laughingly, the first time he and Ben had met: _A legend in his own time_. What did he have to offer someone like Ben, who sat under the stage lights and sang something out of his very being? What had he ever done just for himself, for those ambitions he was so sure of?

Armitage was settling himself on proposed-up pillows, newly dressed in clean pajama bottoms, T-shirt, and cardigan when there was a soft knock on the door — Cassandra. She came in and sat at the foot of his bed, folding her hands on her lap.

“Uh-oh,” Armitage said. “This is serious, then.”

“Armie, I’m going to sound absolutely bonkers telling this to you, but you have to believe me.”

“I’ve been through enough lately that I don’t think anything will sound impossible.”

“Well, just wait.”

Cassandra took a deep breath and then told Armitage about what she’d seen Ben do — first, recounting how he’d taken on the two men who’d harassed her.

“So, I knew he could be… physical,” she said. “It was like he went out there _needing_ to hurt them somehow to… I don’t know, it was like he was trying to get rid of some kind of energy.”

Armitage pictured Ben, his irrepressible exuberance after his performance at New Republic. What Armitage had read as grasping for exposure had merely been Ben’s energy needing to pour out into the cold air along with the steam of his breath. But Armitage hadn’t realized that yet. He had never seen someone so open — someone so _American_ — and so it had seemed unnatural, forced because of that.

“He was defending you,” Armitage said.

“Yes, but he could have avoided it altogether. And it wasn’t just about _me_ — he liked it, being able to hurt them.”

Armitage shrugged. He would have avoided the confrontation, but he understood the desire to cause pain to someone who deserved it. His father, for example.

“Maybe you don’t understand because you’re a girl,” Armitage said, regretting it as soon as he saw Cassandra’s outraged expression.

“I assure you, Armie — you could never fully understand the extent of women’s rage.” She fixed him in her gaze and her green eyes flashed with warning. “Not even Ben, I don’t think. But I still haven’t told you everything.”

She told him of how Ben had knocked Brendol into the car, screaming obscenities and threats. Armitage felt the blood drain from his face, then, though not because he pitied his father; he simply was picturing the scene, trying to imagine Cassandra’s fear at seeing it. Then she described, her voice halting, what came next. Their father’s rage at her, and Ben’s response — the way he had planted his feet in the gravel and reached out with his hand. How Brendol had been dragged across the driveway, clutching at his neck as his face reddened and he clawed for breath.

“Ben said he could have killed him,” Cassandra whispered. “He said he _would_ have killed him.”

Armitage swallowed, traced his fingers over his bruised brow. “Wouldn’t either of us do the same, if we could get away with it?”

“But we couldn’t,” Cassandra said. “Get away with it. Or even _manage_ to do it, not like he did.”

“Cassandra, what you’re telling me is impossible. Nobody can do that.”

Tears had sprung in her eyes. “Ben can. Ben _did_. Ask Phasma. She saw it, too. And Luke and Ms. Sloane, and those two horrible men. We all _saw_ it. Ben will tell you, too. He doesn’t lie. He told me that he really did what father said — the charges were true — assault, arson. He said he had to tell you everything before he would tell me, though.”

“I suppose I’ll have to wait for him, then.”

“You don’t believe me.” The accusation in her voice stung him.

“I do,” he said. “I always believe you. But I want an _explanation._ ”

“Ben didn’t have one,” Cassandra said. “Maybe Luke will. Are you all right on your own for a bit? I’m going to make a proper supper for everyone — it’s not fair expect Mum to do it. And I expect Ben can eat a lot.”

“What is it with you and feeding people lately?” Armitage said..

“What can I say — I’m a natural nurturer.”

Armitage snorted, winced, and then leaned over and kissed the top of his sister’s head.

“Oh, go on now,” Cassandra said, imitating their mother’s brogue. She stood, said, “Remember doctor’s orders — no reading, music, or climbing fences,” and then left the room.

* * *

Armitage lay in the dark, unable to sleep, his mind so weary that he couldn’t assemble a coherent train of thought. He pictured a toy train he had as child. The trains’ cars connected with magnets, but if you lined up the wrong sides, instead of of drawing together, they’d be repelled from each other. Armitage used to try to force the two ends together, enjoying feeling the effect of the invisible force that kept them from touching.

And, as if his mind were of the opposite polarity of Ben Solo, there his thoughts were drawn — more image than words, and more remembered touch than image. He was feeling the memory of Ben’s breath against his skin as they talked at the bar, letting it wash over him once more, the thrill that spread from the warmth on his cheek and ear to his limbs, when a knock on the door startled him.

“Armie?” Cassandra said, peeking her head in the room. “Everyone is here. Luke’s up here to look at your leg. Can he come in?”

Armitage nodded, and Cassandra stepped aside to let Luke in. He was dressed, disconcertingly, in a tattered brown poncho over his clothes. He carried a khaki canvas bag with a faded black caduceus flanked by the letters “U” and “S” stenciled on it. Armitage couldn’t think of someone he’d be less likely to picture as Ben’s uncle. He was short, slightly stocky, light-haired and bearded. His eyes were luminous, deep blue.  It made Armitage wonder what Ben’s parents looked like. Where had he gotten his near-black hair, his brown eyes, his height, his rangy limbs and big hands?

“Do you want me to stay?” Cassandra asked. “For moral support and such?”

“No, that’s OK, Cass,” Armitage said.

“Hey,” Luke said after Cassandra closed the door. “The fabled Armitage. We meet at last.”

“Erm, well, I wish it could have been under different circumstances. I’m not exactly at my best,” Armitage said, scooting himself up. “But it is good to meet you.”

Luke went to the window and pulled open the curtain. “Sorry,” he said, when Armitage winced. “I need the light to examine you. Could you show me where you’re hurt?”

 _I’m hurt all over_ , Armitage thought as he raised the leg of his pajama bottoms.

Luke pulled up Armitage’s desk chair, then opened his bag and unrolled it across the bed. “My old Army medic kit,” he said as he pulled out some rubber gloves. “It’s come in handy with a nephew like Ben, lemme tell you. That kid was always getting into scrapes.”

Luke unwound the bandage from Armitage’s leg slowly, pretending not to notice as Armitage sucked in his breath when the gauze peeled away from his skin.

“I wouldn’t have thought you the army type,” Armitage said, to take his mind off the gash that had now been uncovered. “From what I’ve heard, anyway.”

“Oh, yeah — the eccentric American guru, right?” He shook his head, chuckling. “Nah, I’m just a guy who wants to use what he has to help other people.”

“Why Arkanis, then?” Armitage turned away as Luke examined the cut.

“After I came home from the war, I was down, restless. I wanted to do _something_ worthwhile. I saw a story somewhere — a magazine, maybe, I don’t remember — about the schools here, how they’re so… austere, cheerless, even cruel.”

“That’s the sum of it, yes.”

Luke looked at him with such understanding that that Armitage had to look away.

“I thought that there must be a lot of young people in need of something good in their lives,” Luke said. “So I came here to work in a program to teach kids music.”

“I wish I’d have known about it,” Armitage said. “Though I wasn’t really the joining type.”

Luke looked up from Armitage’s leg. “No, you wouldn’t be, would you? You’re like Ben in that. After doing that work for a while, I kept in touch with some of my students, and that’s how I ended up tangling with your father, as I’m sure you’ve heard about.” He straightened in the chair. “Well, good news — you’re not getting stitches. The cut is just about not deep enough, and the edges are too ragged to suture. It’s been cleaned nicely, but we’ll get some antiseptic on it and close it up with butterfly bandages. You’ll have a pretty impressive scar.”

Luke took out the bandages and opened each package and then lay them in a neat row atop the medic bag. Armitage hissed as Luke sprinkled antiseptic on the wound, but smell of the powder was one Armitage liked. Chemical and sharp, with the stinging coolness of menthol. Luke held the edges of the cut together and began applying the bandages.

“He’s here? Ben, I mean.”

Armitage was watching Luke’s work now, Luke’s deft fingers quickly closing the wound with the bandages. There was something of how Ben played the guitar in his movements, which made sense since Luke was his teacher.

Luke chuckled again. “Of course. Your friend Phasma down there practically had to hold him back to keep him from barging right in here.”

“I hope I haven’t worried him too much. I know that he… he tends to….”

“Feel things _a lot_?” Luke finished, smiling, but not taking his eyes off his work. “He’s been pacing a bit, but I had him meditate — and then Cassandra called, so he thought he had willed into happening, practically.”

Armitage was quiet for a moment, thinking of Ben speaking of them meeting as if it were destiny. He was so earnest, so open.

“I know,” Luke said, as if he had heard what Armitage was thinking. “He’s something, that kid. He means well, but he rushes into everything without thinking, and just sweeps everything along with him — people included. I told Leia — his mom — that with people like Ben, it’s up to those of us who care about them to make sure we don’t hurt them and destroy what’s pure in them.” Luke raised his eyes to Armitage. “Do you understand what I mean?”

Armitage understood it as warning.

“Cass told me,” Armitage said, “about what happened at my father’s house, but I don’t really understand.”

“Neither do we,” Luke said. “We’re meditating on it. Some kind of manifestation of energy control — but I think I should leave it to Ben to talk to you about it.”

There was something in Luke’s demeanor that told Ben that he was apprehensive — fearful, even — of this new power his nephew had manifested.

“There.” Luke said, resting his hand on Armitage’s leg. “All closed up.”

Armitage felt a warmth emanate from where Luke’s palm rested on his skin. It was soothing, taking the edge off the pain.

“Energy,” Armitage said.

“It flows through all things,” Luke said, removing his hand and standing. He began closing up his medic bag.

Ben’s song, Armitage thought. _And John Donne —_ “ _any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind.”_

“Now,” Luke said. “I’ll go get that nephew of mine before he combusts. I can feel him pacing from here.”

Armitage wanted to ask, _What do you mean, you can feel him pacing?_ But he had a feeling the answer would be more incomprehensible than the original statement. This uncle and nephew weren’t anything that could be explained. Not explained by themselves, not by anyone else.

“Thank you,” Armitage said. “Not just for taking care of my leg. I know… I know everything you’ve done for us, for Cass and me.”

“Hey,” Luke said, “if you can’t do the right thing when you can, what’s the use of living, right?”

He tossed a wink over his shoulder and left the room. Armitage took in a deep breath, knowing that, in a moment, when he heard footsteps running up the stairs, it would be Ben, and that Ben would burst into his room as if the wind had pushed him through it, and then Armitage would want to… do what? _Anything_ , he thought. _Anything, everything._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've had a good time devising a sort of magical realist version of Force powers. That means that they're less overt than in canon, and so feats like Ben's telekinesis are a bigger deal, something that even Luke doesn't understand yet --and therefore something he fears.


	15. XV - It's Written All Over My Face

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben tells Armitage his story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm very sorry this chapter has been so long in coming! I've been a bit ill, but I'm doing much better now.
> 
> The title of the chapter is from "I Want the One I Can't Have" by The Smiths.
> 
> June 9, 2019 -- I've added art, a gorgeous commission by [Xyra Brittney](xylavie.carbonmade.com) based on a scene from the movie _England Is Mine_!

### Chapter 15

#### It’s Written All Over My Face

Some minutes passed before Ben came to Armitage’s door, not with the burst through it as Armitage expected, but with a quiet knock that sounded almost tentative. Ben must have crept up the stairs; Armitage hadn’t heard him approach.

Armitage sat himself up and smoothed the wreck of his hair off his forehead as best he could. He was grateful to have an excuse to have closed curtains and hoped his voice didn’t sound too desperate and injured when he said, “Come in.”

The door opened so slowly that Armitage almost groaned from the tension. He saw the mop of dark hair first, then the dark, concerned eyes and eyebrows drawn together. Armitage could hardly believe it. Ben was peeking around the door, like a child sneaking out of his room at night to watch telly.

“It’s all right, Ben,” Armitage said. “You can come in.”

“Sorry,” Ben said, and then appeared, all of him, in his room. He grinned shyly, showing the creases around his mouth, and held a mug. “Cass wanted me to bring up some tea for you.”

“Thank you,” Armitage said.

Ben stood at the foot of his bed, nervously shifting his weight. Could this be the same boy who had rushed toward him, barely keeping himself from touching Armitage’s face?

“A cup of tea sounds marvelous,” Armitage said, trying to nudge Ben forward.

“Oh! Oh, yeah.”

Ben was at his bedside in two long strides. He held out the mug, and Armitage let his hand brush Ben’s when he took it. The mug had warmed Ben’s fingers through; even his fingernails were warm. The two lingered like this for a moment, Ben seeming not to know what to say for once.

“Do you want to sit down?” Armitage asked.

Ben nodded wordlessly and then pulled up the chair, not taking his eyes off Armitage’s face. It had been like this at New Republic, too — they had looked at each other closely, studying each feature with no self-consciousness. Ben was the first to look away, smiling and dropping his eyes. When he looked up again, his gaze was newly intense.

“Does it — does it hurt a lot?” he asked.

“There’s no point in trying to be brave, I suppose,” Armitage said. “It hurts like hell.”

“I’m sorry. None of this would’ve happened if you never met me. I mean, I don’t wish you had never met me because I’m selfish — and I’m sure we were _supposed_ to meet, you know? But I’m sorry that this it what it meant. And Cass — Cass says she’s not hurt, but what happened to her — I really can’t forgive myself, it’s all my fault —”

“Ben,” Armitage said.

“I wouldn’t have let her — if I had known that — ”

“ _Ben_.”

Ben took in a deep breath.

“It’s nobody’s fault but my bloody awful father’s,” Armitage said. “I’m sorry _you_ got pulled into his narcissistic authoritarian dystopia.”

“I got off easy compared to you and Cass. I’d do it again, too, if I had to. For your sake.”

Ben leaned forward on the chair, putting one elbow on his knee. He started to raise his right hand to Armitage’s face, but, like last time, he stopped.

“Is it OK?” he asked. “Can I?”

Armitage hoped the tremble in his mouth didn’t show, but he was certain that it did. “You may,” he said.

Ben reached out slowly, the first two fingers of his right hand extended. And then Armitage didn’t care if Ben saw how he sucked in his breath as Ben touched his bottom lip, where it was split. Those calloused fingertips, still so familiar though Armitage hadn’t felt them in three weeks, rested lightly, tugging down his lip slightly.

Ben’s mouth trembled then, his red lips moist and parted. His eyes were shiny, sad.

“I can feel it,” Ben said. “How it felt went he did that to you.” He lowered his hand — Armitage breathed in sharply again — and looked down at his knees. “I’m glad I didn’t feel this before I saw him. I don’t know if I could have stopped myself. I could have….”

“Ben, Cass told me what happened, but I don’t understand — your uncle says you don’t either.”

Ben closed his eyes and bounced his knees. “It was like… I took all my feelings and made them into something _real_ ,” he said, opening his eyes again. “Not that feelings are real, but something that could affect things — physically, I mean. I — I was just so _angry._ I felt his breath stop. Another few seconds and….”

Ben raised his hands, palms up — Armitage was disconcertedly reminded of Jesus’ gesture in _The Last Supper_ — and looked at them.

“I can’t let myself do that again,” he said. “If I have that kind of power, I don’t know what I am. It scares me. I’ve gotten used to the other stuff, but I don’t think I could ever get used to _that_.”

Ben’s brown eyes were dark in the dim room, but they had a glint that seemed to come from within — and something about it told Armitage that Ben _could_ get used to it, but he was resisting both the ability and the desire. He looked at Ben’s hands and longed to reach out and take one, to bring those fingertips to his lips again, but that glint made him hesitate.

“Ben… Cass said you wanted to explain what happened — before you came to Arkanis. I think — now would be a good time, yes?” This came out sounding more headmaster-like than Armitage meant, and he cringed inwardly at himself.

Ben’s expression instantly became open, his eyes wide. “Oh. right. Yeah.” He rubbed his palms on his thighs. “I hope — I don’t want you to hate me for this. It’s gonna sound pretty bad, but I hope — OK.” He took a deep breath. “I was a freshman in high school — that’s, um, year ten to you? It was a private school — I guess that’s a public school here — why do you call private schools public? It doesn’t make sense. So confusing. Anyway… It was a boarding school, all boys. We wore the matching blazers and ties and everything. They’re common here, I know, but not very much in the States. I was new to this group of kids — my mom had just become a senator, so my parents enrolled me in me a school where I wouldn’t be in the public eye. That’s what they said, but I think they also needed a break from me. I was getting into a few fights and blaming it on my mom because she wasn’t around at home like other kids’ moms, which was shitty of me. I really want to meet your mom, by the way. I bet she’s pretty — you and Cass definitely didn’t get your looks from your dad. You’re beautiful, you know? Delicate, almost.”

Blood rushed to Armitage’s ears, a _whoosh_ and bright, sudden heat. He couldn’t chuck compliments off with an “Oh, go on,” the way his mother and Cassandra did. They were too infrequent and now, coming from Ben, too precious.

Ben didn’t apologize for putting Armitage in this state. Instead, he watched him silently until Armitage met his eyes and whispered, “Thank you.”

“It’s true,” Ben replied, and then, blinking, returned to his narrative. “So at this new school, the other kids were OK with me — I’m a senator’s kid, so I know I’m gonna get treated like one, you know? And I’ve always been tall, so, you know — nobody wants to mess with me anyway. Except for those guys who were bothering Cass. But they were drunk. Did she tell you? They —”

“Ben,” Armitage interrupted.

“Yeah. Sorry. Like I said, they didn’t bother me, even though I could tell they thought I was weird. Guys kept trying to get me to join the football team, but I was more interested in music. And I joined the fencing team because my parents said I should get some extracurriculars. I’m pretty good at it, too. My uncle fenced, too — you wouldn’t think it would be his thing, since he’s so short, but he’s good — and we still practice, sometimes. But music was more important, so I haven’t really kept up with it. ”

Armitage tried to imagine all six-foot-whatever of Ben Solo, the long reach of his legs and arms, coming at someone with a epée leveled, his face hidden by the screen of the fencing mask. No wonder he was good at it. His mere presence as an opponent would have been intimidating.

Ben ducked his head as Armitage scrutinized him, perhaps to hide the flush that had risen on his face. Armitage knew that when he blushed, it was in blotches of pink that crept up his neck, clashing horribly with his ginger hair.  But Ben looked lovely — glowing and shy, despite how open he was when he spoke and the effect he knew he had on Armitage. What would it be to touch his fingertips to one of those blushing cheeks, to those moist red lips? To trace every curving line of his face, to find each of the dark moles that dotted it? Ben would welcome the touch, he was sure. But though Armitage’s fingers twitched at the thought — and something deep in his belly, too — he wasn’t ready. Wasn’t ready for that simple act alone — nor for what it might lead to.

Ben blushed more deeply as Armitage’s thoughts followed this course, as if he really could pick up on them.  A telltale heat was forming on Armitage’s chest, and he had to look away to steady the thump of his heart. Ben shifted in his seat and breathed in to resume his story.

“I guess I sound like a spoiled rich kid,” he said.

Armitage didn’t contradict him. Boarding school, fencing — that was what posh sort, even more so than Phasma, did. If Ben’s family were English, they’d be the sort to have a country manor and a townhouse in London. And yet Ben wasn’t at all posh, with his shaggy hair and scuffed boots, his unabashed emotions open for anyone to see.

He rubbed his hands through his hair and then looked up again. “OK, so I was fine — kind of an outsider and all, but no one picked on me. But I hated seeing what they did to other kids who weren’t as lucky to be big or have important parents. There were some scholarship kids, from families that couldn’t afford the tuition, and they got it worst. There was a group of guys who called them charity cases, freebies, tried to get me to get in on it, too. But I wouldn’t. I didn’t really have any friends there. I always wondered… and I was afraid that someone would figure out that I’m… well, I don’t know really.”

Armitage nodded, understanding. Hiding behind the hedgerow, running across the Blue Bridge — he had known the fear of being found out, but at the same time unsure exactly _what_ there was to be found out. Not having a word for it except for the slurs the other boys yelled after him as he ran.

“Anyway, usually older boys ignored us freshmen, but there was a group of seniors who decided to pick out one kid — his name was Tim, Tim Wharton. They called him… they said he was their bitch. Made him get stuff for them, tripped him up when he brought it, that kind of stuff. Probably worse stuff that I didn’t see. I tried to be extra nice to Tim, but I think he was afraid of being my friend — he wasn’t sure that I wasn’t gonna be like them, since… my family and their position — my family has a lot of money, is what I’m saying. I know you don’t talk about that stuff here, but, yeah, they do. On my mother’s side — her mother. They were railroad tycoons or whatever. Like the Monopoly man.”

He took another deep breath. “Am I tiring you out? Cass said I shouldn’t talk to you for too long because you have to rest.”

Armitage shook his head, gently, though he still had to hold in a hiss of pain. “I like hearing you talk.”

Ben’s mouth spread into a smile, showing his sharp, crooked teeth that Armitage was fascinated by — because they were yet another of Ben’s features that were entirely, utterly _his_.

“I like hearing you talk, too — when you’re better I want to hear you talk about whatever comes into your head.” But then he grew somber. “Not sure you’re gonna like hearing _what_ I’m about to tell you though.” He wiped his lips with the back of his hands and tipped his head back, another gesture that was his alone. “So these seniors — I didn’t know what to do about it. I’m not one for being able to talk things out. But when they started getting physical where I could see it — _that_ I know what to do about. My dad — he’s not like my mom’s side of the family — like I said, he was a brawler in his day. He and my Uncle Chuy — he’s not _really_ my uncle — he’s my dad’s best friend — and his name isn’t really Chuy. It’s Jesus, but Chuy is a nickname for Jesus, don’t ask me how. He’s a _tall_ Mexican guy, taller than me even, has even more hair than me, too, and he —”

“Ben, you were saying?”

“Sorry. Yeah, so one day, we were in the cafeteria at dinner, and Tim was holding a tray for one of those guys. Tim was walking behind him, and the senior stopped suddenly — on purpose so Tim would bump into him. Well, the drink spilled and he — the senior, just turned right around and backhanded Tim. He fell, and then the whole group of them started yelling about how he was crying, and — well, sometimes I just _do_ things, without thinking. It’s like there’s some instinct in me that makes me act, and before I know it, I’m in the middle of punching someone or jumping in a lake or —” he dropped his eyes — “grabbing some boy I just met by the hand. So, anyway, yeah. I jumped on those guys. I had the one who slapped Tim on the ground before he even knew what hit him. I kept punching him, like I was trying to punch _through_ his face into the floor. I… I kinda did the same thing to your father. Sorry.”

Ben curled his hands into fists and Armitage saw for the first time that his knuckles were scraped raw, one of them split.

“Your hand,” Armitage said, wanting to reach out and cover the scrapes with his palm. “You hurt it. On my father’s face, I assume.”

Ben sniffed a laugh. “Yeah. I kinda ambushed him, same as with those guys at school. I don’t exactly fight fair. Learned that from my dad, too.” He smiled, and Armitage thought he was about to launch into another aside, but he just sighed. “Anyway, I was punching that guy and my hand was bloody — some of it was mine, but most of it was his. Finally, his buddies pulled me off of him, but I went after them, too, and had them all out on the floor — there were three of them — but then our P.E. teacher came in and he and a couple of other guys managed to hold me back. I got hauled to the principal — that’s the headmaster — and I tried to explain what happened, but I was the one with blood on my hands — literally — so as far as he was concerned, there was no explanation needed. And I asked ‘What about Tim?’ and he said, ‘Mr. Wharton needs to grow a backbone,’ and it was like something broke in me. It wasn’t that I was mad — angry. It was more like… despair. I just felt how there was this kid hurting and being mistreated, and no one was helping him, except me, and I was getting in trouble for it. I just… _dived_ over the principal’s desk and knocked him off his chair. I don’t really remember what happened then. Uncle Luke says I will, someday, when I’m ready. But I just remember I came back kneeling on the principal’s chest, and he had his arms over his head, and my hands were bloody again and I… I was crying. I felt so helpless.”

Ben was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees now, his hands folded between them. He’d slid forward in the chair so his knees touched the edge of the mattress. It closed some of the distance between them, and Armitage felt Ben’s desire — like that magnetic pull of the train cars — to close it even farther, to touch Armitage — his hands, his face, as he did when he first came in the room. But Ben sighed and dropped his head into his hands again.

“I wanted to _destroy_ something,” Ben said. “So before anyone could grab me, I picked up a chair and threw it through a window. Then I just… I kinda collapsed. I guess they didn’t know what to do with me, so the P.E. teacher took me back to the cafeteria. It was empty. He sat me down at a table and just left and locked the door.”

“He locked you in?” Armitage stomach sunk, thinking of Ben abandoned and angry, only fourteen years old. “They’re all the same at these boys’ schools. In America. In Arkanis. Beastly ghouls. Bullies.”

“Yeah, well… I wasn’t making the greatest decisions in this situation, as my uncle likes to remind me. I sat there for two hours — there was a clock up on the wall, and I watched it. It was dark out, and I was sure they’d forgotten me. And I just got angrier and angrier. So I got the idea — it wasn’t even an idea, really, just a flash, an image, and it felt like something I had to do. To make a point. I went into the kitchen, lit all of the burners on the stove and threw a big bottle of cooking oil on it.”

Armitage felt the blood drain from his lips. “Ben,” he whispered.

“Yeah, my hair got singed, but it’s a wonder I didn’t go up in flames. I don’t remember really, but there was something like… like what I did with your father, when I pulled him to me — I don’t know what Cass told you — but I was keeping the fire contained until I could get out. I broke another window and climbed out, and then… I don’t know, let go? That’s what it felt like, like I had been pushing something, keeping it down, and then I just let go. And the fire just exploded out of the kitchen. And I ran. I found the road and I ran until some police on the way to the school picked me up.”

Ben dropped his head and his hair fell over his face, hiding it entirely.  “They told me I was lucky nobody got hurt or even killed. The cafeteria was separated from the main building by a hallway, so they think that’s why, but really — it was because of me. I made it burn up the whole cafeteria and not spread. I don’t know how, but I know it was me.” He peered up through his hair, his eyes beseeching belief. “Another crazy thing, I know.”

Armitage sat with the story for a moment, not knowing what to say. The pain in his head was slowly spreading, and he leaned back into his pillow with a sigh. Ben, so attuned to Armitage’s every movement, raised his head fully. He grabbed Armitage’s hand, enveloping it in his wide palm, his eyes still entreating.

“Don’t hate me,” Ben whispered.

The heat of Ben’s palm against his own was almost unbearable — as if the fire he had controlled still resided in Ben’s skin. Ben’s skin was burning for _him_ now, Armitage realized, burning to touch him and be touched by him. But Armitage had only the strength in that moment to press Ben’s hand in his and then raise his fingers to Ben’s bottom lip.

“I could never,” Armitage said.

Ben drew in a shuddering breath at Armitage’s touch and didn’t bother blinking back the tears that rose in his eyes.

“I don’t understand it,” Ben said. “I can’t tell you _why_ — why I need you. But I do.”

It was too much. The throb of pain in his head brought Armitage back into the real moment — the one where he was not just reclining on his bed with a beautiful boy staring at him, but also where he was bruised and exhausted and utterly lost. He and Ben simply looked at each other for a moment and then Ben dropped his eyes first.

“You need to rest,” he said.

Armitage felt the truth of it, but he resisted. Just a few more moments, time to whisper words, to exchange another touch. “I —”

“I know,” Ben said. “But I want you to be OK. I’ll be here, yeah? I’ll stay here in the house as long as I can if your mom doesn’t throw me out. I’m not gonna go away from you.”

Ben began to stand to leave, but Armitage tugged at his hand. He pulled him closer, never moving from his place against his propped-up pillows but smiling a bit as he saw how he could draw Ben to him. Ben’s face was so close, his breath on Armitage’s mouth, and then their lips were against each others’ — warm and soft and chaste, but with the promise of more. It was only a moment, hardly more than a touch, but when they both pulled away, it was with a shared gasp. As they remained with their heads tipped together, breathing quickly in unison, Armitage thought Ben was going to press back into the kiss. But instead Ben put his hand on Armitage’s cheek and brushed the bruise at his temple with his fingers, caressing his throat with his thumb.

“I want to stay here with you,” Ben said. “I want to kiss every bit of your face and — I want —” his breath shuddered — “but I can feel that you need to rest.”

Ben dropped his hand and squeezed Armitage’s. Armitage could no longer deny his exhaustion. He closed his eyes. He exhaled slowly. He felt Ben’s hand release his. He heard his bedroom door open, then close. The darkness behind his eyelids was the dark of Ben Solo’s eyes, and spots of color pulsed in it, like fire.


	16. XVI - Boy In a Million

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage's mother gets to know her son's new friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is short chapter, almost an interlude, really.
> 
> The chapter title is from "Golden Lights" by Twinkle. The Smiths covered it, Morrissey having developed an affection for '60s girl singers thanks to his mother's influence. So I felt it was apt for a chapter from Bridget's point of view.

### Chapter 16

#### Boy in a Million

Bridget Flaherty returned to a home full of strangers and a shock of revelations. Bridget held Cassandra as she listened to her daughter recounting what Brendol had done and smoothed Armie’s hair as he whispered to her in his darkened room. She sipped a cup of tea that Phasma made for her. She listened in near bafflement to Rae Sloane’s businesslike arrangement of her and her children’s futures and took her card shakily when Ms. Sloane said, “I’m sure this is all too much right now, Ms. Flaherty. I’ll be happy to talk to you when everything calms down.” And then there was Luke Skywalker, an odd American with bright blue eyes and long hair who shook her hand and congratulated her on her “intrepid” children. They all crowded around the small table in the kitchen and ate the shepherd’s pie that Cassandra made, like some kind of secret society that Bridget was only learning existed.

When they all had left, the boy who remained in Bridget Flaherty’s sitting room was tall and dark and earnest — and, it seemed, besotted. He had slipped down the stairs from Armie’s room as Bridget was arriving home and had said nothing during supper. She had heard his voice when he was doing the washing up with Cassandra, low and too quiet to make out words. But then Cassandra had ushered him out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on the apron she’d put on over her school uniform.

“You stay here and talk to Mum,” Cassandra commanded. “She needs to get to know all about you. Armie would want that.”

He wore a slouchy black sweater that pooled around his elbows and stood with his hands thrust in the pocket of his jeans, his dark eyes intent.

“I was right,” he said — and then she heard that he was American, too. “Armitage looks like you.”

“Well, thank you, love,” Bridget said, her heart filling with an instant compassion for this strange boy. “Who are you, then? How do you know my Armie?”

“I’m Ben. Ben Solo — Luke is my uncle,” he said. Then realizing this didn’t answer her question, he added, “I met Cassandra at the record shop and she introduced me. We both like music — Armitage and me, I mean. Though Cass likes music too. But Armitage and I write songs.”

He held out his hand, so large that hers disappeared in it when she took it.

“Well, hello, Ben. You can call me Bridget.”

“Thank you, Bridget.” He seemed unsure what to do with himself, shifting his weight from foot to foot. “Cass, do you need more help?”

“No, it’s all done. Don’t worry,” Cass said. She crossed to him and put her arms around his waist, her head on his chest. “You’ve helped so much already. Are you staying over then?”

Ben’s eyes darted from Cassandra to Bridget, and he seemed to not know what to do with his arms. He pinned them to his sides and placed his hands on Cassandra’s shoulders.

“I —” Ben said. “I can — if it’s OK —”

Bridget smiled indulgently at him, this odd boy who somehow radiated light around his dark head. “Cassandra can make up the sofa down here for you, Ben, if you don’t mind the lumps.”

“No, I don’t mind,” Ben said over Cassandra’s head as she released him and bounced excitedly. “I mean, I’m sure it’ll be comfortable. Thank you.”

“I’ll go get some blankets, then,” Cassandra said, and she whispered something to Ben before she bounded up the stairs.

Ben blushed, and Bridget understood. She knew her son, and it baffled her that she could have ever mistaken his friendship with Phasma for something more. This boy, this Ben, with his oddly beautiful face and long limbs and open intensity, seemed made to capture her own beautiful boy. She thought fondly of how they must look together — Ben’s near-black hair contrasting with the coppery light of Armitage’s, Armitage’s slender hand, like her own, pressed between Ben’s broad palms. It was a sweet feeling, the thought that Ben had somehow found her children — _fairies_ , _leprechauns, fey folk_ as she heard Phasma call them, with their conversations of overlapping sentences about books, their teasing that was part of their affection for each other.

Bridget held Cassandra and Armitage tightly to her, even when she wasn’t physically near them, knowing that they were rare and strange and perfect, and knowing that it wasn’t merely a mother’s partiality that made her think so. If Cassandra threw her arms around Ben so readily, if Ben blushed at the mention of Armitage — well, then, she knew he was deserving of them.

She gestured at Ben to sit on the sofa as she took the armchair. Before she could ask him anything, he leaned forward and pressed his full lips together, and then the words tumbled from him in his deep voice, his gaze drifting away from her.

“You should know, I came here from the States because I got in a lot of trouble there. I mean, serious trouble. My parents sent me away, basically, so what I did wouldn’t destroy my mother’s career. She’s a senator, which is like, a member of parliament but more important? Kind of? Anyway, I know you must be worried about who Armitage is… is friends with because he’s been through so much with his dad already — and I guess Cass told you I sort of, no, not sort of, _actually_ beat the shit — sorry — beat him up pretty badly — their dad, I mean, not Armitage — I would _never_ — but —”

“Oh, Ben,” Bridget interrupted.  She leaned forward and put her hand on his knee. “Armitage is a grown man, I can’t control whom he’s friends with. But he and Cassandra have excellent judgment — about people, anyway — and I trust them. I’m sure you’re a marvelous friend.”

Ben held out his big hands, showing her his scraped knuckles. “Cass and Armitage know what I am, so I think you should too,” he said quietly.

“ _What_ you are?” Bridget laughed. “You dear boy, you’re not some kind of object in an exhibit. If I know Cass and Armie, all they care about is _who_ you are, and I’m sure that’s all I do, too.”

Ben’s stunned expression washed over Bridget with a wave of tenderness. Here was a boy not accustomed to approval, to acceptance of who he was. But who he was, she knew somehow, was essential to her children’s lives and happiness. And she had only just met him.

“Thank you,” Ben said, his eyes shining.

“Of course,” Bridget said. She settled herself in the armchair. “Now, tell me about Rae Sloane and your uncle. I feel like I’ve been carried off on a gust, the way they came through and arranged everything. Do they do that to you, too?”

“‘Carried off on a gust,’” Ben repeated. “Armitage must get his turns of phrase from you, too.”

“Oh, you know us Irish — gift of the gab and all that.”

Ben shook his head. “I didn’t know that,” he said, disarmingly naive and American.

“I’m sure Armitage will tell you all about his favorite Irish writers,” Bridget replied. Then, using her best motherly authority voice: “Now, what I was asking, then?”

Ben pressed his lips together again, leaning back into the sofa and held his hands palm-to-palm, slowly rubbing them together, twisting them back and forth — not exactly nervously, but with restless energy.

“Everything’s always been arranged for me,” he said. “It’s because of my family. It has to be, you know? There’s so much besides me to consider. We have to be careful.”

“It’s not really something that suits you, I get the feeling.”

“Oh, I dunno. I tend to do so much without thinking it through. I need the structure. To keep me from doing anything _too_ stupid. Like beating up my friends’ dad, I guess.”

Bridget sighed. “Oh, love.” Ben’s cheeks reddened at this. “Is that what you really think or what you’ve been told?”

Ben pondered this for a few moments, twisting his mouth slightly, looking down and to the side as he thought. “To be honest,” he said slowly, “I’m almost afraid of what I’d be like without the structure.”

“Nobody should be afraid of themselves, Ben,” Bridget said.

“I’m not sure that’s true. Not when I know what I have inside me.”

She studied his face, the drawn-together heavy eyebrows, the boyish way his large ears peeped through his wavy dark hair. He was tall and looked strong, but she couldn’t imagine him being dangerous, anything to be afraid of.

Bridget had known from the start that Brendol was not a man to be crossed. The coldness in his eyes, the way his hand formed a fist by his side when his will wasn’t obeyed, the sharp cut of his raised voice — all of this she’d seen by the time Armitage was born, and it took having Cassandra to shake her into the realization that she had to get away from him. It was only the fear of shame that had kept Brendol from beating her or abandoning all of them.

It hadn’t kept him from beating Armitage, though. And she had let it happen.

“What did you do, Ben?” she asked.

All at once, it was as if a shadow was cast over his face. His eyes darkened and he flexed his hands.

“Can I maybe tell you some other time?” His voice was low and marked with pain. “Or you can ask Cass or Armitage. I don’t want to talk about it now.”

“I’m sorry,” Bridget said.

“No,” Ben almost snapped. “Sorry. Don’t be. You deserve to know, but I.... I just can’t right now.”

“Of course.” Bridget stood, then placed her hand on Ben’s shoulder. She could feel him tremble slightly.

Cassandra came trotting down the stairs holding a bundle of bedding, calling out, “I nicked the extra pillow from Armie’s room — he’s out cold, so he won’t notice.”

“You get some rest,” Bridget said to Ben.

She stopped to give Cassandra a kiss on the cheek as she went up to her room. Her lovely daughter, now wearing flannel pajamas, her strawberry blonde hair up in a ponytail — with such fierce strength behind her pretty face. She would need to talk about what she had been through, and another lurch of guilt shook Bridget’s core. Her children had been hurt, and the person who hurt them was the man she had chosen to be their father.

Though, she reminded herself, it seemed at times like she had _not_ chosen him. He had chosen her, and she had felt like she had no choice but to go along with it. And she felt complicit — she had been flattered at first. Brendol’s attention to her was intense at the beginning, and he pursued her with a doggedness that she had mistaken for devotion.

Of course, she had known that he was married. But that seemed to be the way of things in the First Order offices. The secretarial pool was like a holding pen for potential mistresses for the company’s executives. She’d heard much of that changed when Rae Sloane became general manager. Having met the woman now, Bridget believed it. But Bridget had left her job by then — she was pregnant with Armitage, and Brendol didn’t want a scandal.

At the top of the stairs, Bridget stopped at Armitage’s door. She almost knocked, but not wanting to wake him, she eased the door open instead. There he lay asleep on his back, his hands tangled in the blankets by his sides, his pale skin slightly luminous in the dark. Bridget sat down in the chair next to the bed.

She used to watch him sleep when he was a baby, a small child. She had promised to always keep him safe, then. Something of the child’s face was still there while he slept, in the thick lashes on his cheeks and the pink lips that were slack in repose, though the bottom one was split now. Bridget leaned forward and placed her hand on his cheek, taking care to avoid the bruise on his temple.

“Oh, me boy,” she whispered, her Irish accent that Brendol scorned so much coming out as she watched her sleeping son. “I’m sorry.”

She had raised a gentle and sensitive boy, and now he was a painfully vulnerable young man, so sure of his talents and yet afraid to test them. But he would have to. There was no question of him returning to his job at First Order now — he couldn’t. He would have to face what his true calling was. Perhaps Ben could inspire the confidence in his words and voice that she never could, but she wished Armitage could find it in himself on his own.

But then — there was that dark look that had come over Ben’s face so suddenly. There was something behind it — pain, Bridget thought. And Armitage understood that all too well.

She gave his cheek a last caress and then left his room, walking slowly backwards to keep him in her gaze as long as she could.


	17. XVII - Let Your Puny Body Lie Down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben and Armitage have a quiet moment alone together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is from ["Stretch Out and Wait" by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/pnv0JnyOaTE).

### Chapter 17

#### Let Your Skinny Body Lie Down

The pillow Cassandra brought Ben smelled like Armitage. Not that Ben truly knew what Armitage smelled like, but Cassandra said she had taken it from his room, and there was a _rightness_ to the scent that matched the faint memory of that night at New Republic, when they had spoken into each other’s ears. He couldn’t put words to the scent itself, only what it reminded him of — rain and tears and breath and dreams.

There was an old country song that his father used to croon, half-jokingly, to his mother. Ben sang it now, under his breath: “ _Send me the pillow that you dream on so, darlin’, I can dream on it too._ ” He’d have loved to hear Armitage sing, to let melodies from his lips wrap themselves around him.

Shifting on the couch — it was too narrow for him to lie on his back — Ben pressed his cheek into the pillow, thinking of how his own breath fell where Armitage’s had and the fabric against his skin had once cradled Armitage’s face.

 _Why?_ Why was he so sure of his feelings? It wasn’t that Armitage was beautiful — though he was — but it was the way he looked that contrasted so much with Ben, his golden-red hair compared to Ben’s dark brown; his pale, luminous skin compared to Ben’s, which tanned easily and was dotted with dark moles; his slight figure, so slender — Ben was almost sure he could encompass Armitage’s waist in his hands — compared to his broad chest and shoulders, his arms and legs that were muscled from his fencing practice. And then there was Armitage’s quiet reserve, his glib quips that covered how he felt, or his eloquence when he chose to speak earnestly, so different from the clumsy confessions and thoughts that spilled from Ben’s lips all too easily or the dark silence that hung over him when he couldn’t explain his feelings. It was as if they could nest together in their differences, filling each other’s hollow parts. Ben longed for it.

Ben groaned into the pillow, thinking of the brief moment when his lips had been against Armitage’s — the hesitancy of it when really he wanted to consume him, devour him, make him part of himself. He was still there, upstairs. If only he weren’t hurt, if only they were alone, if only….

 _If only_.

Ben shifted again, turning to face the back of the couch, curling up as much as he could. He ignored the beginning of an ache low in his belly and instead concentrated on his breath, the way Luke had taught him. Soon, his mind quieted, and in the silence of the dark house, he drifted to sleep with the certainty that he would see Armitage in the morning.

* * *

 

Ben didn’t have to wait as long as he thought. A sound in the early morning woke him — the squeak of the armchair’s springs. When he opened his eyes, the thin morning light was behind Armitage, silhouetting him and making his hair shine like a halo. His face was in shadow, but when he turned slightly, the light caught in his green eyes, glinting on the flecks of gold and silver. He wasn’t wearing his glasses. The line of his lips, pink against his pale skin, still marred by the fading cut, curved deliciously, his lips slightly parted. His hands were on the arms of the chair, fingertips pressing into the faded upholstery.

Ben blinked, bringing Armitage into sharper focus.

“Good morning,” Armitage said.

His voice was soft, still tired, but full of what Ben dared not call affection. But then he felt it — the swell of emotion that was both in him and in Armitage.

Ben swallowed. “Hi.”

“Everybody’s still asleep. I hope I’m not waking you too early. I’ve been sleeping so much that it seems I can’t anymore.”

“No, no,” Ben said. “I don’t mind.”

“Would you like some toast?” Armitage asked.

“Oh. Yeah, sure. Thanks.”

Armitage moved to rise, but Ben sat up suddenly.

“No, wait,” Ben said. “I mean… I should do it. You’re still recovering.”

Armitage gazed at him. “Your hair is all mussed from sleeping,” he said.

Ben’s hand flew to his head, ready to smooth down the waves and tangles.

“No, leave it,” Armitage said. “I like seeing you like this. And I want to do something for you, so… toast.”

Ben was grateful for the blanket piled on his lap. He kept himself from blurting out what he was thinking — _There’s so much that I wish you’d do for me._

Armitage shuffled into the kitchen, limping a bit because of his cut leg. He was wearing pajamas with light blue stripes and a burgundy cardigan over them. Ben had slept in his clothes; Cassandra had offered some of Armitage’s pajamas, but that had been too much for Ben. With his body covered with clothes that had touched Armitage’s, he would have had no control of what it might have done to him. And any of Armitage’s pajamas would have been too small for him — which is what he told Cassandra.

Armitage popped his head out of the kitchen.  “Do you drink tea? I suppose you probably prefer coffee, but we don’t have any, not even crystals.”

 _Crystals?_ “Um, tea is fine. I’ve gotten used to it, living here.”

They were silent as Armitage worked in the kitchen. Ben tried to decide how he should sit on the sofa, rearranging his legs, putting his arm along the backrest, lowering it. When Armitage came in with a tray, Ben was sitting cross-legged with his feet up on the sofa — the way Luke had him sit when they meditated — and he was leaning with his elbow on knee, chin cupped in hand.

Armitage set the tray down on the coffee table, hesitated, and then sat down on the sofa next to Ben. A tingle ran up Ben’s arms, and he found his whole body instantly turned toward him. What would happen if he just threw his arms around him now? What would happen if he put his fingertips on the side of his neck? What would happen if he kissed him?

But he made himself not do what every impulse begged him to do and merely smiled, shyly, his cheeks warming from the array of images that had flashed through his mind.

“Shall I be mother?” Armitage asked, picking up the teapot.

“What?” Ben flushed even more, not sure what Armitage was referring to. Did he mean —

“I mean — should I pour our tea?”

“Oh! Oh, yeah. Thanks. I drink it plain,” Ben added, noticing the little pitcher of milk.

“Plain? How novel.” Armitage poured, his slender wrists peeping from his pajama sleeves, and then handed Ben the cup. It was white with two black stripes running around it, warm to the touch. “Have some toast,” Armitage said, and Ben obeyed, grateful to have something to do with his hands.

Armitage put three spoons of sugar in his tea, and then filled it to the brim with milk but managed to bring it to his lips without spilling a drop. His chin and jaw had two days of stubble, catching the light from the window, and once Ben’s gaze drifted to the curve of Armitage’s lips he found it difficult to look away.

After he took a sip, Armitage set the cup down and then slowly, awkwardly, reached over and rested his fingers on the back of Ben’s hand, the one around the cup, keeping his gaze there for a moment. He swallowed hard, and then lifted his eyes to meet Ben’s. The green of them was so luminous, their expression so earnest that Ben struggled not to drop his cup.

“Thank you for staying,” Armitage said, and his voice was low and sweet and beautiful in Ben’s ears.

“I couldn’t leave,” Ben said. With the mug and toast in his hands, he couldn’t grasp Armitage’s as he wanted to, couldn’t bring his fingers to his lips.  “I had to be where you are. To know you’re OK. I couldn’t stand the thought of not being under the same roof.”

“Neither could I,” Armitage said, and his cheeks lit up pink and lovely, all the way up to his eyes and out to the tips of his ears, which his coppery hair brushed. “I slept so well, knowing somehow, that you were here. I came downstairs hoping, hardly daring to hope, and there you were. Like a sleeping Adonis.”

Ben didn’t know exactly what Armitage was referring to — a Greek myth, he thought — but he felt the admiration, the almost worshipful meaning of it.

He laughed to cover his discomfort. He never did well with compliments. “Snoring with my mouth open, no doubt.”

“Not at all,” Armitage said. He curled his fingers around Ben’s hand for a moment and then withdrew his touch. Ben’s stomach lurched. He set down his mug and munched on his piece of toast, unsure, his hands trembling.

“I don’t know what to say for once,” Ben said. He licked a bit of butter off of his fingers. “That night at New Republic, we talked about so much, but now — it’s like my brain is… I don’t know, it’s just a whooshing sound in there.”

Armitage smiled now, just a small curve in the corners of his mouth. “Well, what do you propose we do instead of talking?” he asked. There was a tremor in his voice.

Ben felt his eyes go wide and the questions again began to tangle themselves up in his mind. Could he mean…? His voice, was he as nervous as Ben was? Was he as certain as Ben was?

And then, before he could think about resisting the impulse, Ben’s arms were around Armitage’s waist, and Armitage’s eyes were looking into his as Armitage nodded slightly, barely perceptibly, giving permission. And then Ben’s mouth was against Armitage’s, and he was warm, so warm. He felt the cut on Armitage’s mouth, and the rush of feeling — his compassion for Armitage’s pain, his anger at Brendol Hux — made him dive deeper into the kiss, his lips pushing Armitage’s open. Their teeth clashed briefly and they both pulled back a bit from the kiss, finding their breath, finding a rhythm and motions that were almost drowsy in their pleasure-seeking, as if they could remain here on the sofa as long as they liked, without anyone to interrupt them.

Armitage had placed his hands on Ben’s forearms, but he began to work them around to his back, pressing his own body closer to Ben’s. His narrow chest, the delicacy of his fingers’ touch — it all sent thrills through Ben like he’d never known before. He could smell Armitage’s skin, the scent he had breathed in all night with his face against his pillow. When Ben let out a quiet moan when Armitage’s hands found their way to the nape of his neck, and tugged the ends of his hair between his fingers, Ben was startled, as if the sound had been snatched out of him. Armitage answered with a hum against Ben’s mouth, the tip of his tongue darting out as if to take a quick taste of Ben’s bottom lip. It was too much. Ben pulled away with a gasp to catch his breath. His lips felt swollen, bruised. He bowed his head, forehead against Armitage’s, both of them rising and falling as they breathed.

“I’m sorry,” Armitage said. “Was that… Did you not like it?”

Ben laughed. “How could you ask me that? It’s just that I… I’ve never… Did I do OK?”

“I don’t have very much experience with this, either,” Armitage said, “but I’d say yes. You did more than OK.”

Ben tipped his head back to look at Armitage’s face and then reached out to touch his lip.

“You’re bleeding,” Ben said.

“I don’t care.”

Ben placed a light kiss where his lip was split. “What now?” he asked.

“I suppose… we could do more of the same?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’d like that. But.…”

“But what?”

“You said you don’t have ‘much’ experience. Does that mean you have _some?_ ”

Armitage pulled back slightly, his chest giving one great heave as he closed his eyes. The light caught on his lashes, making them glow like gold.

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” Ben said hurriedly. “I wouldn’t have asked, only — I’ve never — and maybe you could help me understand the right way —”

“ _Ben,_ ” Armitage said, his voice a husky tenor ring. He reached out and slipped his slender hand under Ben’s, resting his palm on Ben’s knee. “It was nothing, really. A fleeting crush, rarely more than chaste, stolen pecks behind the gym, that sort of thing. Then the other boys got suspicious.”

“Oh,” Ben said. “Oh, I’m sorry.”

“He — his name was Doph — was shuffled off to another school before he could get the worst of it. And I learned how to hide. How to run. Some part of me is always that boy, I think — sixteen, clumsy and shy.”

Tenderness overwhelmed Ben, as if he had been plunged into warm water, his head under but content not to breathe. He was breathless anyway from the heady rush of emotion, from the nearness of Armitage. He answered Armitage’s confession by putting his hands back around his waist and pulling Armitage to him. Armitage swooned toward his mouth, so willing that Ben could hardly stand it. He dived into the kiss like a starving man.

 _I_ _was_ _starving_ , he thought. _Starving for this, starving for love. I knew it the moment I saw him. I knew it I knew it I knew_

Without really intending it, he slipped his right hand under Armitage’s cardigan and pajama top, and the feeling of his smooth, cool skin almost made Ben jump. The contact shot through his hand, up his arm, igniting a need — to feel more of Armitage’s skin, all of it. He leaned in, pressing Armitage backward onto the arm of the sofa. Their hips touched as Ben braced himself above Armitage with one hand on the sofa — he didn’t want to put his weight on Armitage, but, oh, at the same time he did, he did. He wanted that skinny body beneath his, to whisper words into his ear and feel Armitage’s hands twined in his hair.

Armitage grabbed the front of Ben’s sweater to pull him closer, and Ben let out something like a helpless yelp that was immediately muffled against Armitage’s mouth. Armitage laughed quietly and took Ben’s bottom lip between his teeth. Ben gave a little whimper as Armitage bit down, the tiny nip of pain resonating through his body as much as the pleasure of kisses.

Armitage resume those kisses with fervor, using Ben’s shoulders to pull himself up so that their chests touched, so that more than their hips touched. The feeling of Armitage’s stubble — much softer than he thought it would be — against his cheek was like hundreds of the same tiny pricks of pain, and Ben groaned, hardly able to believe that this man, this slight, fae-like, beautiful man was kissing him. Kissing _him_ , Ben Solo, the senator’s son who had to be sent away and hidden; Ben Solo, the boy with the odd face, the big nose that bumped against Armitage’s now, the red, pouting lips, the too-large hands that made him fear what they could do.

In the midst of their fumbling — Ben’s groan had made Armitage dig his fingers into Ben’s side and buck up his hips — Ben felt Armitage’s arousal against his own. And then — suddenly — Armitage was bending his bony knees up, pushing them into Ben’s abdomen. Armitage slid from beneath him and then sat back down on the couch, panting.

Ben looked at him, dazed from kisses, not understanding. “Armitage?” he said hesitantly.

“I — I think that’s well enough for now,” Armitage said. His face and chest where it was bared by the V-neck of his pajama shirt were blotched with a deep blush. His lips looked even fuller, bee-stung, the cut glowing cherry red in the pink.

Ben realized he was breathing hard too, as if he’d been dueling with a particularly skilled opponent. That was a novelty — he hadn’t told Armitage, but nobody had ever bested him when he fenced, not even his uncle.

 _Good. Yeah. Think about Uncle Luke,_ Ben thought as he shifted carefully back to sitting, trying to hide his erection. _Uncle Luke with cheese curds all over his hands._

Ben steadied his breathing. “No — I mean — yeah, I guess you’re right. We’ve hardly even gotten a chance to talk again. Except for me babbling about my tortured childhood.”

Armitage sighed thinly, pulling his knees to his chest. “And I doing the same.” He turned to face Ben. “I’m sorry I pushed you off like that, without any warning. It wasn’t because I didn’t like it. It was because — because…. I can’t explain just yet.”

“Don’t apologize,” Ben said. “You never have to be sorry for anything — not to me.”

Armitage reached out and put his hand against Ben’s cheek, caressing his mouth with his thumb, brushing back the dark waves of hair from Ben’s temple.

“You dear, strange boy,” Armitage breathed. “You are lovely, and you are here, and yet I want to give myself time to enjoy you slowly.”

Ben put his hand over Armitage’s, covering it completely, and kissed his palm. “Then isn’t it lucky that we’re young and have all the time in the world?”

“And even if we didn’t — this moment, here with you, would mean I could die a happy man.”

Ben bit down softly on the heel of Armitage’s palm. “No talk of you dying.”

“Forgive me — the Eros-Thanatos impulse is strong in me. I get love all mixed up with death.”

Ben watched as Armitage looked back at him, as he blinked slowly and his lashes brushed his cheeks. _Love_. He had said _love_.  Ben’s knowledge of Greek myth wasn’t expansive, but he knew that _Eros_ meant more than love — it meant sensual pleasure, it meant _sex._

And all at once the hidden part of Armitage’s mind that Ben had felt made sense. Of course Armitage was afraid — his only ever brush with tenderness had ended in terror.

“There’s nothing you need to be forgiven for,” Ben said. “Not ever.”

Slowly, Armitage moved himself closer to Ben. He slid one of his hands across Ben’s stomach, wrapped the other behind him, and then sunk into him, his head nestled against Ben’s neck.

“Then I won’t have to apologize for keeping you hostage like this,” Armitage said, his breath warm on Ben’s throat. “Forever.”

Ben put his arm around Armitage’s shoulder and dipped his head to rest his cheek against his brow. They stayed like this, murmuring about the smell of each other’s skin, the beauty of each other’s voices, the color of each other’s eyes, until, slowly, they slipped into sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song that Ben remembers Han singing to Leia is ["Send Me the Pillow You Dream On" by Hank Locklin](https://youtu.be/PdHl3yVYyUE). Morrissey quotes from it at the end of the Smiths song ["Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others"](https://youtu.be/BLSLx5wt9Fg).
> 
> Armitage describes himself as "sixteen, clumsy and shy" — that is from the Smiths song ["Half a Person"](https://youtu.be/hz0UADjaHKo).


	18. XVIII - I Won't Share You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More alone time for Ben and Armitage. And Armitage makes a resolution.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is the same as the song "I Won't Share You" by [The Smiths](https://youtu.be/pgpfTP6EB-Q).
> 
> Sorry for the wait! Holidays, you know.

### Chapter 18

#### I Won’t Share You

The truth was, Armitage had planned it all out. What he would say, what he would do. How he would creep down the stairs and sit in the armchair and wait for Ben to wake. His speech would be measured; he would take care with every action. But when Ben’s eyes had opened and gazed at him, everything Armitage had planned to say after “Good morning” flew straight from his head. And so everything he said had been what he meant — every earnest compliment, every confession, every touch — every kiss. He still couldn’t quite believe it was real.

But he woke to the bustle of Cassandra and Bridget rising for the day, and he was in Ben’s arms, his cheek against his shoulder. Ben was awake and smiled shyly when Armitage sat up.

“We kinda drifted off there,” Ben said. “It was nice.”

Armitage hardly had time to smile back before Cassandra came trotting down the stairs, calling out, “Make yourselves decent, boys!”

Ben blushed brightly and, overcome, Armitage leaned forward and placed a quick, light kiss on his reddened lips. Ben moved in to return it, but Armitage put a finger on Ben’s lips to stop him.

“It’s just Cass,” Ben said.

“I know,” Armitage said. “I just want to keep your kisses for myself for a little while.”

Ben smiled again, but there was a hesitancy in it that shamed Armitage. He was a coward; he was the boy hiding in the storage closet; he was the man who chose to believe he was being used rather than succumb to something real and beautiful and true.

Ben was that — real and beautiful and true — and he deserved to be treated as such.

But Armitage was afraid. He ran his mind over his fears, feeling their alternatingly blunt and sharp edges — like running his tongue over his teeth. Before he could face this one, he knew he would have to confront the fear that ran deepest, that cut sharpest, that bludgeoned with the most force. Luke and Ms. Sloane may have rearranged the structure of Armitage’s life, but they could not do the same with his mind. Brendol Hux could not be excised from Armitage’s existence any more than his blood could be removed from Armitage’s veins. He could not be exorcised; he could only be confronted.

But for now, he twined his hand with Ben’s, relishing the feeling of sliding his slender fingers between Ben’s larger ones — the warmth, the slither of skin. He held his hand there for a moment and then quickly released Ben’s hand when Cassandra appeared at the foot of the stairs. She was smiling knowingly and happily, still in her stockinged feet, her hair loose and bouncing on her shoulders. She came over to the sofa and squeezed herself between Ben and Armitage, elbowing her brother to get him to scoot over.

“Room for the Holy Spirit, Mr. Fitzhux!” she said, imitating Sister Magdalene’s voice, before flopping her head into Armitage’s shoulder.

“Oy,” Armitage muttered.

“What does that mean, ‘Fitzhux’?” Ben asked. I heard your friend Phasma say it, too.”

“‘Fitz’ is a prefix in surnames traditionally given to illegitimate children. It means ‘son of’ in Norman French,” Cassandra recited. “We are not the children of the General’s lawfully wedded wife and must bear the ignominy.”

“Oh,” Ben said as Cassandra laughed merrily. “I saw her — your father’s wife, I mean.”

“Oh, _Maratelle_.” Cassandra rolled her eyes. “Phasma called her a dried up cow, Armie, can you believe it?”

Armitage _hmphed_ grimly. “That woman must be dead inside — there’s no other way to explain how she can tolerate being married to him. Mum got the better half of the bargain I’m sure.”

Beside him, Ben was silent. He rubbed his fingertips against his knee, his gaze on his feet.

“She is,” he says, finally, his voice low and deliberate. “Dead inside, I mean. Practically. I could feel it when Phasma and I first saw her. She’s someone being, I dunno, led through life. Just going along with it because fighting against it hurt too much. It makes you think.”

“Think what?” Armitage asked. He wondered if Ben were reproofing him and Cassandra. He wanted to lean into Ben a bit, to tell him he wasn’t heartless.

“That, even when you’re the victim of horrible things, the choices you make can still mean you’re a monster. She tried to tell Phasma and me that Cass wasn’t at the house. You can hurt people because you feel nothing just as much as if you hated them.”

From the other side of Cassandra, Armitage looked at Ben’s profile. His lower lip was pushed out, as plump and red as it was after they kissed, but Ben was somber. His hair fell in waves over his cheek, and his mouth gave a tremble when he breathed in. Armitage wished he knew what part of the revelation made Ben shudder so, made him push his hair back off his face with both hands, revealing one adorably large ear, and then sigh and release it so it fanned once more across forehead. Armitage wanted to brush it aside, to uncover Ben’s eyes and his dark brows and smooth out the furrowed worry lines on his forehead.

“When they brought me into the house, she looked at me with complete indifference,” Cassandra said. “Just as if I was a new piece of furniture for that room. It was dead creepy, Armie. Like I was being brought in to match the canopy bed and ruffled curtains.”

That was when Armitage knew it was not a question of _if_ he would confront Brendol but of _when_. Suck out the poison, cut out the tumor. Next to him, Ben’s posture stiffened, as if sensing his resolve.

Later, when Bridget had gone to work and Cassandra to school, and they were back in each other’s arms — in Armitage’s room, now, hesitant and fully clothed on the bed, Buzzcocks playing softly on the turntable — Ben broke away. He leaned his forehead on Armitage’s and held his jaw in his hands.

“I don’t want you to go see your father,” he said, breathy. “I’m afraid he’ll hurt you again.”

“If he does, so be it,” Armitage said, feeling bright and invincible with Ben’s hands against his face. “It’ll be worth it to rid myself of him. I’ll always be in some kind of pain if I don’t.”

Ben dropped his hands and leaned back against the headboard. Armitage chased him with a kiss that Ben returned hungrily, but once the press was lessened and their bodies slackened, Ben once again paused. He stroked Armitage’s wrist as he spoke this time, his eyes fixed on it.

“I always thought I didn’t get the greatest dad,” Ben said. “My dad — I told you he got into his fair share of fights when he was young. He reformed once he married my mom — for the sake of her career, and all that. But he and Uncle Chuy, they’d reminisce about it — who punched some redneck, who tackled three guys at once. Me — when I — _if_ I get into fights, I don’t like it. Even if I think I had a good reason for fighting. _Usually_ , I don’t like it.” He shifted, leaning forward so Armitage had to slide back from being practically in Ben’s lap. “With my dad, it was kind of a laugh. Nobody wanted to do real damage, and sometimes he’d even buddy up with the same guys he fought with. But your father… he wants to hurt people. Not even just physically. Like with Cass — he wanted to show her that she’s his property, that she can’t escape from him.”

“You could… sense all that?” Armitage asked. “Like, reading his mind?”

Ben pressed his lips together, almost pouting. “Kind of. His feelings weren’t as clear as yours are to me. But still clear enough to make me — well, I told you that I sense people better if they’re the kind of people who would understand me, and I sensed him well enough to know there’s something in us both that’s the same.”

“You’re nothing like him,” Armitage said, surprised at how defiant, almost angry, his voice was. The taste of Ben’s lips was on his. The thought was sacrilege.

“I wanted to hurt him, Armitage,” Ben burst out. “I wanted to _kill_ him. I almost — I almost didn’t come to see you again because you don’t deserve that. You shouldn’t have someone like that around you, not after what your father’s done to you all your life.”

“Do you not _want_ to be around me?” Armitage asked.

“Yes! I mean no! I mean, I _do_ want to be with — around you,” Ben said, color rising in his cheeks.

“Then let me worry about whom I _should_ have around me. If you want to be here and if I want you here — and I do — then that settles it.”

Ben laughed softly. “Cass said something like that after you told her not to talk to me.”

“Perverse defiance is a Fitzhux trait, it seems,” Armitage said.

Ben’s eyebrows drew together and the blush on his cheeks quickly drained. “Perverse?”

“Just being ironic,” Armitage said. “I mean we stick to what we want even if it may not be good for us. Because we know that it’s exactly what we need.”

Ben smirked back at him and then dived at Armitage, knocking him backward. Armitage scrambled, looking for a handhold and ended up with a handful of Ben’s sweater, sending them both tumbling off the bed. They landed laughing, though Armitage felt a jolt of pain in his head, settling into a throb on his bruised temple. Ben braced his hands on the floor to keep himself from crushing Armitage.

“Ben!” Armitage yelped. “You’re just like an over-exuberant puppy! I’m a convalescent, remember.”

Ben looked down at Armitage, his dark hair falling like a curtain around his face.. “A puppy, hunh?” he said, flashing his odd white teeth. And then he leaned his face close to Armitage’s and licked him, lightly, chin to cheek. “How’s that for a puppy?”

“Only one lick? That’s not usual for puppies, as far as I know.”

Ben licked him again, a light flick on the tip of Armitage’s nose, but before he could place another Armitage grabbed Ben’s sweater again and pulled him closer, capturing his mouth with his own. Ben’s lips were pliant, soft — Armitage wished he could look at them at the same time as kissing them. He chased after them until he had pushed Ben up to sitting and twined his arms around his waist, his hands twisting in his sweater again, feeling for the muscles beneath the skin. Ben set his teeth into Armitage’s bottom lip, and Armitage drew back with a gasp.

“I’m sorry,” Ben said. His eyes were still half-closed, his lips red and full. “I thought — puppy, you know.”

“No, no,” Armitage said. “Don’t apologize. I liked it — it just was… surprising, how much I did.”

Ben grinned, bouncing onto his knees happily. “Then maybe….”

“I’ve stretched your sweater all out,” Armitage said, abruptly, sitting back on his heels.

“Oh.” Ben glanced down. His black sweater draped loosely around his neck, the sleeves nearly covering his hands. “Yeah. That’s OK. I’ll just….” He pulled it over his head by the yoke, tugging up the hem of his white T-shirt at the same time. Armitage looked away, but not before he caught a tantalizing flash of smooth skin and a line of dark hair leading into the waistband of Ben’s jeans. When he got the sweater all the way off, Ben’s hair was fluffed and mussed, his grin sheepish.

“I was getting kinda warm anyway,” he said.

“Arkanis in October is known for its balmy weather, after all,” Armitage replied with a smirk.

Ben’s face fell slightly. “Don’t — please don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Get… I dunno… _distant_. Like you’re pulling away — mentally, I mean. Emotionally.”

“Ah, well. I suppose I tend to do that.”

Armitage looked down at his hands, wondering what was wrong with him. There was a beautiful boy on the floor in front of him, and all he could think of to do after kissing him and falling off the bed with him was make flippant comments. The bite had done it — it had thrilled him in a way that was almost frightening, laid his vulnerability so entirely bare that he could hardly bear to be in his own skin.

“I have an idea,” Ben said. “Will you do me a favor?”

 _Anything_ , Armitage thought. _I thought I’d do anything, everything — but will I?_

“Yes,” he said.

Ben cocked his head toward the record player. “Will you sing along with this for me?”

“What Do I Get” was playing, the guitar chords driving, the drums skipping along, Pete Shelley’s voice a plaintive whine. Armitage swallowed.

“All right,” he said, and picked up the song on the refrain.

_I only get sleepless nights_

_Alone here in my half-empty bed._

_For you, things seem to turn out right._

_I wish they'd only happen to me instead._

His singing voice, never raised around anyone else since he was a boy in church, was a clear, steady tenor. He sang softly, just for Ben, whose dark eyes were wide, enraptured — so intent that Armitage had to drop his gaze again.

_I just want a lover like any other, what do I get?_

_I only want a friend who will love to the end, what do I get?_

Armitage lifted his eyes again when Ben put out his hands for him to take. 

“Thank you for that. I loved it,” Ben said. Ben hauled him to his feet — as if he weighed nothing at all, Armitage noted. “Dance with me.”

“I don’t dance,” Armitage said, his mind circling around the shape of Ben’s mouth as he pronounce “loved” in that drawn-out American way.

Ben grinned. “Neither do I.” He pulled Armitage against him. “But you’re supposed to be resting, right? So maybe… lean against me, yeah?”

“This isn’t really a slow dance song.”

Ben laughed, a short bark of amusement. “Who the fuck cares.”

Armitage had to admit to himself that the ache in his head was wearying him once more, so he let Ben’s broad body cradle him as they swayed in time to the jangling beat of “I Don’t Mind.” He felt Ben’s heartbeat, thumping quickly against his chest, heard his breath, felt his hair brush against his cheek. Ben’s hands were on his hips.

“That night, at New Republic,” Armitage said, “I imagined that I felt this. It was almost real.”

“Me too,” Ben said, and his voice was low and ragged, as if he were holding something back. “But it’s better than I imagined. You’re more solid. Then, it was like you were hardly real, you were so perfect.”

“And now I’m not perfect?”

Ben frowned. “No, that’s not — I mean —”

Armitage laughed softly. “Don’t worry, Ben. I’d rather be real than perfect anyway.”

When the song ended, Ben steered Armitage back to the bed and sat him down.

“You have to rest some more,” he said, sitting down in the chair next to the bed. “Cass told me — no music, no talking. And we’ve been doing both!”

“And more besides,” Armitage added.

Smile lines creased in the corner of Ben’s mouth. “So rest. I’d stay here all day with you, but I gotta get home and shower and change my clothes.” He picked up his sweater from the floor and gave it a shake to turn it right-side out. “And, I dunno, Uncle Luke will probably tell me I should meditate on the origin of my anger or something.”

“Your Uncle Luke seems to tell a lot of people what they should do.”

“Yeah. Yeah, he does,” Ben said, the words staccato. “But you should see my mom. She’s even worse. But I guess I’m no better. I want to make people _feel_ things, and I have that, I dunno, ability to make them feel what I think they should.”

“Do you think you’re making _me_ feel what you think I should?”

Ben shook his head. “No, I can feel that — it’s not me doing that. It’s… something bigger.”

“Whatever it is, nobody is _making_ me. Is it so hard to believe, Ben Solo, that people respond to you because of _you_? Who you are, what you do, I mean — not because of some psychic influence?”

“Not hard. Impossible. Look at me — I’m big and strange and awkward, and I have… this.” He gestured, a hand passing over his face.

“Oh, Ben. If only you knew how perfect you are.”

“Nah. I’d rather be real than perfect, too.”

He leaned over and kissed Armitage, his lips full and moist, long enough for them both to need to catch their breath. Ben stood with another grin.

“Now get some rest. I’ll be back later, yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m going to take care of you, get you all better, you’ll see. And when you’re well enough, I’ll wait here for you to get back from telling your father to fuck off forever.”

Ben walked to the door, then turned back with a smile that reminded Armitage of Luke’s wink.

“I don’t want to leave,” he said.

“Then don’t.”

“Rest,” Ben said, and then he was gone, the door closing behind him.

Armitage settled back down in his bed, pushing his face deep into his pillow, his lips still tingling from kissing Ben’s, the nerves in his skin singing as if anticipating another touch of Ben’s calloused fingertips, his own fingers wanting to reach out and find Ben’s skin beneath them. He writhed slightly against his mattress, cursing himself. And then he reached down to lift the needle from the record, closed his eyes, and pictured Ben’s face when they’d parted from their goodbye kiss — pleasure-drunk but also cocky in his knowledge of the effect his lips had on Armitage. And before he could imagine more, he was asleep once more.


	19. XIX - They Must Be Taken in Hand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage faces his father.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is from ["Barbarism Begins at Home" by The Smiths](https://youtu.be/y_T1NE4Q2BI).

### Chapter 19

#### They Must Be Taken in Hand

It was raining, of course it was raining, as Armitage and Phasma pulled up the street to Brendol Hux’s house. Phasma pulled up to the house, but not into the driveway, and Armitage looked through the rain at the faintly glowing window on the first floor.

“Somebody’s home,” he said, feeling the dread build in his stomach. He knew he shouldn’t have been out yet, so soon after the concussion. His head was beginning to throb already, and he had to wear sunglasses despite the rain.

“That was the plan, yeah?” Phasma peered out the passenger side window with him.

“Yes, but it doesn’t make the prospect any more palatable.”

“Who fucking cares about ‘palatable.’ Go in there and get shit done.”

Armitage sighed deeply. He traced a drop of rain sliding down the glass.

I’d drop you off in the driveway, but I don’t think it’s a good idea for anyone to see my car.”

“No, I agree. Just give me a moment.”

“Pretend you’re just going in to get my jacket back.”

“What?”

“I left my jacket inside when we all had to run out. So did Ben. Walk up there pretending that’s why you’re there. It’ll give you a clear objective and take the pressure off. Plus, it’ll throw them off, and you’ll have the upper hand.”

“I’m beginning to think you missed your calling in MI5, Phas. Her Majesty’s Secret Service needs strategic minds like yours.”

“Oh, bollocks off, Arm,” Phasma said, grinning. “Are you going to go in there or what? Shouldn’t take longer than the time it takes me to finish a fag.”

She pulled a package of cigarettes from her pocket and tapped one out.

“All right, then,” Armitage said, opening the door. “Into the fray.”

He turned the collar of his overcoat up, took off his sunglasses, and then trotted up the driveway with his head ducked down. He hadn’t brought his umbrella,  and the rain fell through his hair. He pictured the bedraggled mess that he’d be on his father’s doorstep.

 _These are the things that kill me_.

Armitage looked at the button for the doorbell once he was up to the door. He knew that if pressed, chimes would play the same melody as Big Ben striking the hour, just so utterly bourgeois that the thought of it sent a shudder across his skin.

So he knocked.

He expected the housekeeper, Parmila, to open the door, as she always did the few times Armitage and Cassandra had been permitted to visit in the past. She would laugh when Armitage called her “Mrs. Khan” and sneak ladoo into his jacket pockets that he’d find later as his father drove them back to the terrace house on Emperors Street.

But it was Maratelle who opened the door. Her face was grayish, resigned, and Armitage thought of what Ben had said about her. She was being led through life; she felt nothing. Ben had said it with such pity, though not quite compassion.

Armitage felt neither as he looked at her. Maratelle had not merely stood by and watched as her husband kidnapped and held Cassandra against her will. She had lied to keep Phasma and Ben from finding her. Armitage would never forgive Maratelle for that.

“I expected you’d be here eventually,” Maratelle said.

Her Received Pronunciation was native to her, languid in a way that it never could be from Brendol. He fought to maintain discipline over the way his lips formed and his throat clipped each vowel so he never seemed at ease. Not that ease was natural in a man like Brendol Hux, either.

“I’ve come to retrieve Cassandra’s and my friends’ coats,” Armitage said. “And Cassandra’s school satchel.”

Maratelle was too well-bred to outright show surprise, but Armitage caught it in a quick quirk of her brow, the lines creasing it momentarily etched deeper.

“Yes,” she said. “Yes, of course. They did leave them behind in the… in their hurry.”

“May I come in?” Armitage asked after a beat.

Wordlessly, Martelle stepped aside and opened the door wider.

“Does Mrs. Khan have the day off?”

“You needn’t concern yourself with our domestic arrangements, Armitage,” Maratelle murmured. “I’ll go see to those coats.”

Armitage nodded, his throat terribly dry. Now that he was inside, though, everything was easier than he thought it would be.

“They said at the First Order office that my father is at home today. He’s in his study, I assume?”

Before Maratelle could answer or deter him, Armitage was walking across the foyer. He knew where his father’s private study was, beyond the library, in the ground floor of the tower where he’d held Cassandra.

She followed him, beginning to make an effort to stop him. “Now, Armitage, I’m sure you don’t want to burst in on him unaware; you know how he can be.”

Armitage turned, hand resting on the doorknob to the library. Maratelle’s eyes were on the bruising that was still livid on his temple and her hand was held out, slightly, as if she were debating touching him on the arm, trying to keep him from harm in a way that was almost maternal. But it wasn’t enough to soften him toward her.

“I don’t give a sodding fuck how he can be,” Armitage hissed, opening the door.

Maratelle made a quiet, alarmed sound in her throat, but said nothing more.

Through the library — Armitage glanced at the books on the shelves. He’d been impressed with them as a child, but he saw now that they’d never been moved from the places where they’d always been, their leatherbound spines uncreased. The rug that he was dripping on now was just as sumptuous as ever, the wood paneling just as dark and rich. Armitage understood the rage, then, that must have coursed through Ben when he set fire to his school — that desire to destroy rather than run. Armitage swallowed it down, keeping it in him, transforming it to resolve.

He’d ask Ben later, what it was like to feel that anger and act on it, to live life in that kind of unfiltered American way — every emotion at the surface. As much as they could be, anyway. Armitage knew that Ben’s feelings ran deeper than he was able to express in words — and that was what he had heard in his voice that night when Ben had sung “Five Years.” That longing and sadness about the tragedy of being human and mortal.

Armitage supposed it was lucky for both of them that Ben’s senses were so attuned his feelings, or else there would have never been any of these moments — his hand held in Ben’s in New Republic, the weeks of his own overwrought agony, the whispered confessions, the kisses, the warmth of somebody solid and present and beautiful against his body. Armitage would have gone on feeling and never speaking, wanting and never reaching out, never _doing_ anything had Ben not drawn him forward. And it wasn’t like being compelled to act — it was more that Ben’s utter openness gave Armitage permission to do what he wanted to do rather than shy from it.

And here he was, doing something he wanted to do. The realization made his stomach flip-flop, his head whirl, but just for a moment. He regained his bearings as he reached for the knob of Brendol’s study. His hand shook, but he could ignore that — he just needed to be on the other side.

Armitage hadn’t planned what he was going to say. He had thought about it, agonized over it, but none of the words he put together had the gestalt he was looking for. He knew he would have to wait until the moment when he stood looking at his father.

And here he was. But he still didn’t bloody know _what_ he wanted to say.

 _Bollocks_.

Brendol sat at a round table, his hand around a tumbler with an inch of amber-colored liquid. His posture was bowed, his shirt — unbuttoned at the cuffs and neck — rumpled. Brendol said nothing as he raised his eyes and met Armitage’s. Brendol’s were flat and dull with drinking and what wasn’t exactly resignation. More like the wet ashes of a doused fire. The power had gone out of him. Armitage thought of Luke, the brightness of his blue eyes, the mischief behind their intensity. How different it must be for Ben, knowing that he could go home and find his uncle there to listen to him. Armitage silently returned Brendol’s gaze, thinking of all the ways his father had failed him, unable to summon any pity for the deflated man sitting at the table.

“Well, boy,” Brendol finally said, his voice thick with brandy, “what is it?”

Armitage, so used to his emotions flaring in heat on his cheeks, almost started at his own reaction — a current of indifference so cold that it made his skin go over in goosebumps.

“You gave me my name,” Armitage said, his voice low and steady and utterly unlike itself, “so why won’t you call me by it.”

Brendol’s eyes returned unsteadily to his tumbler. “I call _men_ by their names,” he mumbled.

“What do you call yourself, then, _Father?_ ” Armitage asked.

Brendol’s arm twitched, making the brandy slosh in the glass. “So I suppose you’ve not come to apologize.”

Armitage stalked over to the round table, ducking to try to see Brendol’s face, which hung in shadow. He studied his father for a moment, the faded red of his hair, the stubble on his chin, the bloated flesh of his fingers.

“I didn’t know why I came,” Armitage said. “Not until now. Now I know. I came to see you broken.”

When Brendol looked up, Armitage could see that the whites of his eyes were bloodshot and slightly yellowish behind the spidery vessels.

“Ha!” Brendol tried to bark out a defiant laugh. But it was thin and bitter. Brittle. He turned back to his drink.

Armitage straightened. “I’ve gotten what I came here for,” he said. “Except —”

“What is it? Spare me your limp-wristed dramatics.”

“I’ve got to go get my boyfriend’s jacket from your _wife_ ,” Armitage said. “If she’s willing to give it up.”

And he turned and left, his chest full. When the study door closed behind Armitage, it was as if Brendol Hux were disappearing into nothing — dissolving. He would be less than nothing in Armitage’s life. He would be something that was once there, then was gone, and no longer mattered. Not one bloody bit.

He walked through library, and the unread books no longer mattered; the waste of a fire in the fireplace of an empty room no longer mattered. Armitage stood in front of it for two or three minutes, letting his clothes dry, holding out his hands to warm them. This was a house where nobody lived anymore, he told himself; he could stand there all day if he wanted to and it wouldn’t matter. But he couldn’t leave Phasma waiting outside. He rubbed his hands through his hair and shook it out, spattering drops of water that hissed on the fire.

The library door opened slightly, then Maratelle slowly slid into the room, Phasma’s leather jacket and Ben’s coat slung over her arm, Cassandra’s satchel held by the strap in her hand. She stood close to the wall, as if she had become a guest in her own home.

“It’s all right,” Armitage said. “I’m still in one piece, as you can see. You needn’t worry, I’ll be leaving you now, if you would just —” He held out his hands.

“Oh, yes, of course.” Maratelle took two steps forward and then held out the coats and satchel.

Armitage looked at her for a moment after he took them from her. She wasn’t beautiful the way his mother was. Maratelle had aristocratic, handsome face, the upright bearing of a woman raised to be a rich man’s wife. Did she think she had come down in the world, marrying a nouveau riche working man who had to hide his Northern accent?

 _Good then_ , Armitage thought.

“I don’t know if you deserved what you got when you married my father,” he said to her, pleased that he had captured the right gallant tone, “but if you didn’t, you’ve endeavored to do so since then quite admirably.”

Maratelle’s lips moved automatically to thank him for what sounded like a compliment. Then her face froze in an expression of shock that sunk into comprehension. Silently, she stepped aside so Armitage could walk out of the library.

Armitage walked past her through the wood-paneled hallway, into the gleaming foyer. Maratelle followed him out of the ingrained habit of seeing guests out, but he didn’t turn around to acknowledge her. He opened the front door, stepped out, and then closed it behind him, knowing he’d never return.

Only then did he allow himself to be aware of Ben’s coat in his arms — heavy black wool, the sleeves so long that they nearly dragged on the ground. He held it out in both hands and shook it, imagining Ben in it. He’d never seen him wear it. There had only been that leather jacket he wore the day they met, the ridiculous black sweater he wore the first time they kissed — had it really just been last night? In the rain, a warm, musky smell emanated from the wool. Armitage held it to his face for a moment, finding the scent of Ben’s skin, imagining his hair brush the collar.

When he looked up, he saw Phasma had pulled the car up to the end of the driveway. He could just make out that she was peering through the window at him and making _get over here_ gestures. He quickly bundled up the coat and trotted down the gravel driveway.

“Bloody hell!” Phasma said when he got in the car. “Look at the state of you! You would have stood there until nightfall holding that coat to your face when you’ve got the boy it belongs to waiting for you.”

Armitage barely felt the water dripping from his hair. “Do you think so?”

Phasma curled her lip at him. “Don’t be obnoxious. Of course he is. You’ve gone and gotten yourself a _big_ , lovely, American boyfriend, and gods help us all.”

 _Boyfriend_. Armitage had called Ben that, earlier, when he was speaking to his father.

“You’re grinning like an idiot,” Phasma said. She pulled out into the street. “But you’ll have a date for my show opening.”

Armitage turned away from the view through the windshield toward her. “Show? Your art?”

“Yes. I’ve managed to scrape together a collection while also being your agony aunt, amazingly enough. And it’s going in the spring show. The opening is two weeks hence, so mark your calendar. But be warned, you’re going as an artist as well.”

“What? How?”

Phasma fished in her coat pocket and, without looking, held out a screenprinted flyer. A bit blotchy, but recognizable, was their Self-Terminator Machine — a row of varied knives, bottles of poison, a half-dozen cocked pistols — all on gears, with levers and cranks, their utility purposely incomprehensible.

“Our Impossible Machines?” Armitage said.

“Your technical specifications will be displayed with the art — I redid all of them to look like actual blueprints. My advisor _loved_ them and _insisted_ that they be the centerpiece of the show!” Phasma bounced excitedly in her seat as she drove. “I’ve been so anxious to tell you — and I wanted to ask you if it was all right — but you had the concussion and all… _this_ … you know.”

“I know,” Armitage said. His heart was pattering, like the raindrops falling on the window. “It’s all right. More than all right. It’s quite… I’m glad I had a hand in what will no doubt be your triumphant debut into the Arkunian art scene. Will I have to do anything? At this reception?”

“Nothing more than stand there and look pretty,” Phasma said.

“How will I fill the time between now and then?”

Phasma smirked. “I’m sure you an Ben will figure something out.”

Armitage’s stomach dropped, the way it felt as a kid when he used to look down at the ground while swinging high. He couldn’t answer.

“How did it go in there?” Phasma finally asked. “With your father. Not bring down the mood or anything, but I want to make sure everything’s good, yeah?”

“Everything is good,” Armitage said. “I never have to see him again.”

“ _Hmm_ ,” Phasma hummed. “Good fucking riddance.”

“To bad rubbish,” Armitage concurred. “And Phasma — thank you. For helping with all this.”

“Don’t get all maudlin on me, Fitzhux.” She looked at him from the corners of her eyes. “Cass gave me Ben’s address.”

“Oh did she.”

“Should I drop you off? So you can give Ben his coat, of course.”

Armitage took a slightly shuddering breath in. “Yes. Please. If you don’t mind.”

They were pulling off the expressway back into town. Arkanis stretched out before them, the clock tower at the center of town, the smokestacks of the factories puffing near the river, which glinted in the afternoon sun that was beginning to gleam through the clouds. It had never looked beautiful to Armitage, but now, seeing it, knowing there was someone in it who wanted him — it was home, and it was lovely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhhh, cruising into the dénouement now, I think. If you've noticed that the time of year keeps shifting, you are astute. I have to go back and make that consistent! This fic takes place in 1980, and something happened in May of that year that I realized I wanted to include.


	20. XX - Take Me to the Haven of Your Bed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage and Ben find their way together again. But there's something out there....

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is from "Reel Around the Fountain" by The Smiths

### Chapter 20

#### Take Me to the Haven of Your Bed

Ben was trying to meditate — _again_ — when he felt the knock on the door before he actually heard it. He jumped to his feet, nearly tripped on his shoes that he’d left in his room’s doorway, and ran down the hall. Luke was out with Mrs. Sloane, and Ben had been hoping — _willing_ — that the phone would ring, and that he would hear Armitage’s voice on the other end, and then Ben would get to say, “I’m here alone. Come over.”

But he had managed to will what he couldn’t have even hoped for — that Armitage would show up without even having to be asked. Ben opened the door, and there he was, damp hair sticking to his forehead, his pale hands clutching what looked like Ben’s black wool peacoat.

Ben’s mood fell a bit when he saw that Armitage’s friend Phasma was with him, but she merely caught his eye, smirked and cocked an eyebrow, and said, “Bye then, Arm and Ben. Give me a ring if you need a ride, yeah?” before turning back down the hall to the lift.

“I’m sorry to just turn up like this —” Armitage began, but Ben grabbed his hands and pulled him inside.

Before the door even slammed shut, Ben’s mouth was on Armitage’s, his nostrils full of the smell of wet wool and Arkanis rain and Armitage’s skin. He wanted to say so much and wanted Armitage to say to much to him, but he wanted to kiss him even more. He had his hands wound up in the thick fabric of Armitage’s overcoat, pulling him to him.

It was as if their mouths had been formed to meet, Ben thought, leaning forward as he tried to take in more of him — more of Armitage’s breath and moist lips. He grabbed the peacoat that was still between them and dropped it to the floor. Without meaning to, he had backed them both into the living room and then toppled them onto one of Luke’s ridiculous beanbags.

Armitage opened his eyes and gasped as he sunk into it with Ben’s weight on him, Ben’s hands under his coat, Ben’s chest pressed against his.

“I’m sorry,” Ben said, easing away. “I know I’m heavy.”

Armitage slid his slender hands around Ben’s waist and pulled him back down. “You are,” he said. “But I find that —” he closed his eyes and shuddered as their hips met, then continued, breathless— “that I rather like it.”

Ben grinned. He was giddy with the pleasure of his body against Armitage’s but aware the whole time of Armitage’s caution, his memories of shame mingling with the pleasure of what they were doing.

“Enough to keep on going?” Ben asked. He flicked his hair from his eyes so he could see Armitage clearly, his pink flushed face, his green eyes inviting under pale lashes.

“Yes, I think I —” and he pulled Ben even closer, moving his hands up his back, to kiss him again, opening his mouth to him now, sliding his tongue against Ben’s lips.

They both moaned in something like surprise and then laughed, lips still touching.

“Do you like that?” Armitage asked, tipping his forehead into Ben’s, his chin tucked.

“Yeah,” Ben said. “Do it again?”

“Of course.” Armitage shifted in the beanbag. “It’ll be easier, though, I think, if we —”

He put his hands on Ben’s shoulders, pushing him gently away so he could sit up just enough to wiggle out of his coat. The movements made Armitage’s hips writhe, and Ben had to bite his lip to keep himself from letting out a groan. Armitage braced his hands against the floor and pulled himself up farther. Ben hovered, on his knees, unsure of what to do.

“Come closer,” Armitage said.

With a tap against each knee, he got Ben to sit with them spread apart, and then scooted himself between them. And then — Ben was lightheaded as he realized what was happening — Armitage wrapped his legs around Ben’s hips, crossing his ankles behind him and resting his knees on Ben’s thighs.

“There, better,” Armitage said.

“You’re — ah — flexible.”

Armitage smiled and put his hands once more on Ben’s waist, and as if the delight leaping from him propelled him, Ben threw himself into Armitage. He captured his mouth in his, put his hands against Armitage’s face, his fingers in his damp hair. Sitting up, Armitage could press into Ben, and he tilted fully into their kiss, his hands resting on Ben’s hip bones. In this position, it was impossible for Ben to hide how turned on he was, his arousal pressing against Armitage’s thigh. He quickly pulled away, dropping his hands to his sides.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

Armitage was — what was that?  Alarmed? Afraid?

But Armitage pulled him closer again. “No, it’s all right,” he said.

He bowed his head against Ben’s shoulder, steadying his breath.

“This is the best thing I’ve ever felt,” Ben said, clutching his hands into his knees. “I imagined — it’s OK, right? That I imagined what it would be like to be with you like this? I imagined it, but I could never have thought it would be this perfect, that  — oh fuck, Armitage, that your lips would be so soft and you would… you would want…..” He paused, trying to find his thoughts in the midst of sensation and emotion. “But you’re scared. Should I stop? I don’t want —”

Armitage lifted his head and looked steadily into Ben’s eyes, so intently that Ben shivered, feeling his lips tremble with the desire to kiss him again, to feel every bit of his skin. The light in the room was dim, the blinds mostly closed, but there was enough to glint on every one of Armitage’s eyelashes, to highlight his thick eyebrows, to catch on his cheekbones.

“I _am_ scared,” Armitage said. “But don’t stop.”

He put his hands, trembling slightly, on Ben’s and closed his fingers around his palms. Slowly, he placed each one on his hips, positioning Ben’s thumbs on the ridge of the bone. Ben sucked in his breath. His hands felt so clumsily large on Armitage’s slender body — a squeeze, and he’d leave the imprints of his fingers on Armitage’s pale skin, skin he hasn’t yet seen but could imagine, both how it looked and how it felt. It would be cool to the touch, smooth like marble.

“Don’t stop,” Armitage repeated with a low growl in his throat.

And this time when Ben kissed him, Armitage arched his body against Ben’s —belly against belly, Armitage’s narrow chest against Ben’s broad one, then the unmistakable throbs of arousal pitching Ben into an almost rapturous state. Armitage’s mouth was open on his, his tongue was on his, his hands were working their way under his T-shirt, fingertips finding skin.

Ben returned the growl and let his hands squeeze into Armitage’s flesh, let his fingers seek out his skin, let his voice whimper when he found it, even more smooth than he imagined, the feeling of it under his fingertips like a maddening caress. How would he be able to stand more? But he wanted more, no matter what it would do to him. He felt Armitage’s ribs beneath his skin now, felt the knobs of his spine, felt Armitage’s erection undisguised against his own now, and still wanting more, more —

“Do you want more?” he asked Armitage, when they paused, his forehead against Armitage’s neck.

“Yes,” Armitage breathes. “That is — if you do.”

Ben answered with his lips once more, with his teeth lightly on the skin of Armitage’s neck.

“Perhaps,” Armitage said with a bit of a hitch, then a gasp as Ben sucked where he had placed his mouth, “perhaps we should — ah god — I can’t believe this is — we should—”

“We should what?” Ben asked. The taste of Armitage’s skin was on his tongue — like rain, like salt, like soap — and he was ready to give him — “Anything, just tell me.”

“Perhaps we should go to your room? So we’re not interrupted?”

Ben broke away with a grin. “Yeah — yeah, that’s a good idea, actually. Just — I want to do something, just don’t freak out, I just want to see if I can.”

“If you can what?”

Ben cursed himself inwardly. He was being ridiculous. But he couldn’t turn back now — he would only start explaining and babbling, and he couldn’t waste the moment, not with Armitage here, in his arms with his legs around his hips.

“Hold onto me? Like — with your arms around my neck?” he asked, his stomach soaring as Armitage complied without hesitation. He put his hands low on on Armitage’s hips and gripped — and the giving of soft flesh was almost enough to undo him momentarily, but he closes his eyes, steadied himself. “Squeeze your knees against me,” he said.  “I’m just gonna —”

And he stood, lifting Armitage as he did.

“Oh!” Armitage breathed. “Oh bloody fucking — you are a marvel, you bloody beast of a boy.”

Ben’s laugh was immediately muffled against Armitage’s mouth. Armitage was suddenly greedy, biting at Ben’s lower lip, hitching himself higher against Ben’s body, undisguisedly grinding his arousal into Ben’s torso. Ben momentarily froze, almost disbelieving that this man he had dreamed of and wanted and was sure he should have was there, doing _that._

“Take me to your bed,” Armitage growled into Ben’s ear.

The heat of the demand propelled Ben to action. He carried Armitage blindly down the hallway to his bedroom, their mouths locked together. Ben almost tripped on his shoes again, and Armitage bit down on his lip as he staggered. Ben managed to steer himself toward his bed, and they collapsed there, Ben resting on his elbows above Armitage as Armitage kicked off his shoes and scrambled to get his hands under Ben’s T-shirt. Armitage’s hands were warm and soft, with none of the calluses that Ben had, each tapered finger imparting a different sensation.

How? How was this beautiful person there, beneath him, touching him? And now — fluttering his eyes open, looking up at him, placing one hand with its fingers twined in his hair to pull his mouth back down into a kiss, this kiss that Ben felt like had never stopped since the moment he first placed his lips on Armitage’s. Ben broke away to look at Armitage again, at the flush on the sharp peaks of his cheekbones, his moist, swollen lips.

“You’re beautiful,” he whispered. “I know I keep saying that, but it’s — I can’t stop wanting to look at you — and can’t stop wanting to touch you and kiss you and I can’t do all of it at once.”

Underneath him, Armitage shifted his hips. “One at a time then,” he said, smiling. “You should see yourself now, though, Ben. _You’re_ beautiful — the way your hair hangs around your face, and your mouth, it’s — it’s so red it’s almost obscene.”

“Obscene?” Ben furrowed his brow, remembering Armitage saying _perverse_ the day before.

Armitage laughed softly. “You perfect innocent, I mean that it makes me want to do unspeakable things to you. In a good way.”

But Ben kept frowning, trying to understand what he was feeling from Armitage. There, behind all the eagerness, behind his desire and his — oh fuck, his hard dick on Ben’s hip — was a secret shame, but one that he didn’t want to rid himself of altogether.

“I don’t understand,” Ben said. “Nothing you could want to do to me is _unspeakable_.”

Armitage’s fingers were working through his hair, sliding against his scalp.

“You’re a perfect angel,” Armitage said, his eyes roving slowly over Ben’s features. “Nobody ever taught you that you should be ashamed of something that gives you pleasure. You’ve never heard the phrase _the love that dare not speak its name_.”

Ben’s first, startled response was indignation. _Angel? When you know what I’ve done, when I’ve shown what I am?_ But Armitage had said _love_ , too — said it again — and as he watched Armitage — oh fuck — sink his teeth into his own lower lip as he slid his fingers under the waistband of Ben’s jeans, resting them just atop his hip, he understood, he felt what Armitage felt and knew that Armitage was right. All Ben’s life, those who loved him had tried to keep him from pain, had tried to help him find what would bring him joy.

And now — now he had it. He had his music and he had this man whose every inch of skin he would learn — he knew that, he knew that with certainty. He pulled Armitage’s sweater over his head, finding a plain white undershirt beneath — _vests_ , they called them here — the peaks of Armitage’s nipples pushing out the thin fabric. His collarbones formed cups beneath his throat, his pale shoulders had a dusting of freckles, and Ben’s broad fingers were splayed over his chest, finding each notch of bone, each hollow of skin, feeling the heat of Armitage’s flush beneath his palm.

Ben ached — in every way, it seemed — for more. For more of the pressure against his dick, more of Armitage’s mouth on his skin, more of Armitage’s voice, the sinuousness that differentiated it from all the other Northern-accented voices he’d heard, more of himself bare so that Armitage could see him, every bit of him, and devour him up with his eyes.

But — he also needed to breathe, he realized. He was practically gasping, trying to swallow down air, his hands tightening now around Armitage’s shoulders. With a jolt, he realized that something had changed, that there was a shift in the energy of the little world he and Ben inhabited in Arkanis.

“Ben,” Armitage said, softly. “All right?”

Ben closed his eyes, shook his head, said, “Yes, I mean, no — I mean, I want you, oh god, I want you, but it’s too much, too much, like — I think something has — something has happened.”

Armitage tensed under his hands. “Something?”

“Something bad — but not to Cass,” he added, feeling Armitage’s alarm. “Not to anyone we know, not really. No one is in danger. But it’s something — there’s a dark place in Arkanis, and it’s swallowed someone. It’s the same thing that tries to swallow you, Armitage, and I won’t let it — I won’t, I’ll fight to keep you safe, I won’t —”

“ _Ben_ ,” Armitage said. “If it’s too much, we’ll stop, all right?” He breathed in deeply, let it out with a shudder. “It’s fine. Come here.”

He opened his arms and Ben settled into them, feeling somehow safe against Armitage’s slim body with his cheek resting on his shoulder, safe as Armitage put his arms around him and sunk himself into the mattress, arranging them both comfortably.

“I’m sorry,” Ben said. “I wanted — I wanted to keep going, but I couldn’t breathe all of a sudden, and I just have this feeling, I don’t know what it is.”

“Don’t apologize,” Armitage said.

His voice was calm, steady, but Ben could hear the thumping of his heart, feel the muddle of his thoughts.

“I just don’t want you to think it’s because you did anything wrong, that I didn’t want you, what we were doing,” Ben said. He closed his eyes again; with Armitage’s skin against his cheek, his senses were experiencing too much already.

“I don’t think that,” Armitage said. “Of course I was concerned — you’re young, Ben, I don’t want you to feel like I’m —”

“No, no, no,” Ben insisted, able to finish Armitage’s sentence before he could. “You’re not. You’re not. You could never.”

“I hope not,” Armitage said. “Do you want to talk about it? The darkness in Arkanis?”

Ben shook his head. “No. I need — I need to find out what happened first and I need to… to think about it then. Just — Cass was worried about you, and she asked me for help —”

Armitage sniffed. “Did she now?”

“Don’t tell her I told you. But now I’m seeing — what if it’s not just that we were supposed to meet so that we could — so that _this_ could happen? What if it’s something else?” Ben felt that he was nearing something, a realization. “The darkness has something to do with your father. Something to do with First Order Manufacturing.”

“Well, then let it,” Armitage said. “I have nothing to do with either anymore.”

Ben nodded against Armitage’s chest.  He would need to meditate. He would need to ask Luke. But now — Armitage was placing his lips against Ben’s hair, and Ben was so lost in the pure ecstasy of the moment, that he almost didn’t notice the knock on the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I like the bookending of the knock on the door -- one Ben knows about before it happens, but the other one he hardly notices and didn't anticipate.


	21. XXI - Into No Man's Land

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage and Ben are interrupted with tragic news.
> 
> (Please see content warnings below in the notes.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning: references to suicide and the murder of children (nothing specifically described)
> 
> The title of this chapter is from "Disorder" by Joy Division

### Chapter 21

#### Into No Man's Land

Ben, barefoot and snog-rumpled, went to answer the door. Armitage watched his distinctive, long-limbed figure lope out of the room as he leaned against the wall next to Ben’s bed, collecting his breath and his thoughts. _What_ was he doing? It was as if his body had taken over — he had never known such a feeling of abandon. Every hesitation had disappeared when he put his mouth on Ben’s, when he felt his skin under his fingertips. He was tracing the lines of the brown plaid coverlet of Ben’s bed, fully aware of the goofy smile on his face, directed at no one but himself, when he heard a familiar voice call out his name.

“Arm!”

It was a quick, clipped syllable, richly pronounced.

_Phasma._

Armitage looked for his jumper, found it on the floor next to the bed, and hurried to pull it on. And then there was another, higher in pitch, sounding distraught.

“Armie!”

 _Cassandra_.

Armitage was on his feet instantly, but Phasma and Cassandra were already at the door to the room. He felt a blush beginning to form on his neck — here he was, on a rumpled bed, clearly still in the process of redressing, probably looking thoroughly well-kissed.

If she noticed, Cassandra didn’t pause to comment on it. She practically tumbled in, wearing her school uniform with the blouse untucked, her feet only in socks — she must have left her Wellies near the door.

“Oh, Armie, it’s just awful, everyone is talking about it —” she began.

“What-his-name, your editor at _AMW_ , is looking for you,” Phasma interrupted. “He needs you to cover the story.”

Ben appeared behind them, looking beautiful and, yes, still kiss-drunk — but stunned in another way. _Something happened_ , he had said just a couple of minutes before.

“What story?” Armitage said.

“Ian Curtis!” Cassandra cried.

“Cass, I can’t piece together what is happening if you just exclaim disjointed things at me,” Armitage said, running a hand through his hair in annoyance. “Ian Curtis? From Joy Division? What about him?”

“He’s dead,” Phasma said.

Cassandra sniffled and Armitage stood riveted to the floor, blinking, momentarily uncomprehending.

“Was it… he had epilepsy, didn’t he?” Armitage asked.

Cassandra and Phasma looked at each other.

Ben stepped forward, his head bowed. “He killed himself,” he said, voice low and coming from deep in his chest. “It’s what I said — there’s something dark in Arkanis.”

Armitage finally sunk down onto the bed again, letting his hands dangle between his knees.

“ _Something?_ ” he said to Ben. “The despair that takes hold of a person that way — that’s not some arcane power, Ben. It’s their mind, turning on them.”

He took a deep breath and lifted his eyes. Ben was looking at him with utter openness, the fear written clearly on his face, the way his red lips pressed together and his brow creased.

“I should know,” Armitage added softly.

“No, it’s — it’s something more,” Ben said. He paced in a circle, agitated. “It’s something I can stop, Armitage, before it takes someone else.”

 _Before it takes you_ hung in the air, unspoken.

“ _Ben_ ,” Armitage cut in, his voice sterner than he meant it to be.

Ben stopped pacing, his arms folded across his chest. Armitage stood and took hold of Ben’s elbows. He gazed at him, their eyes nearly level — a rare thing, to have someone of a height, for both of them — for two breaths. Phasma took Cassandra gently by the arm and tugged her out of the room.

“Ben, you have to stop,” he said. “You got Cassandra back, you frightened my father into parting with money and power — you’ve done _enough_. I am very grateful. But you can’t keep on playing my savior.”

“But —”

“I don’t _need_ you to be that, all right? Can’t we just be… _this_ to each other?”

Armitage leaned forward and kissed Ben, lightly. He put his hands on Ben’s, closed around them, his slender fingers disappearing into Ben’s palms, and then lowered Ben’s hands so that they could lean against each other.

“Can we?” Armitage asked once he and Ben parted from the kiss. He rested his forehead against Ben’s.

“Yeah,” Ben said. “But I still think —”

All at once the same discontent Armitage had felt after Ben’s confrontation with his father surged back up to the surface. Armitage had confronted Brendol to take control of his _own_ life. And here he was — with this strange American boy who was treating him like a damsel in distress, as if the force of effort he had made meant nothing.

“Ben, I’m sorry, but I don’t _care_ what you think about some big cosmic plot right now,” Armitage said, releasing Ben’s hands. “Something really bloody terrible has happened, and I need to find out what I’m needed for.”

Armitage bent quickly down to pick up his shoes so he wouldn’t have to meet Ben’s eyes. But when he sat down on the bed to put them on, he couldn’t avoid it. Ben’s had his teeth in his lower lip, sunk into the red flesh, and his eyes wavered with moisture. He blinked.

Armitage sighed. “I can’t pretend to understand everything that you feel, but can’t _you_ feel that _I_ am fine? That nothing dark is going to take me?”

Ben looked at him without speaking for so long that Armitage had to shift his gaze back to his shoes. He dallied with the lace of his oxfords, untying and then tying them again.

“I can’t be sure what I feel,” Ben said. “It’s too mixed up with what I’m afraid of. I need to talk to my uncle. I need to meditate.”

More of this — the kinds of spiritual earnestness the members of The Beatles had at the end, everything that everyone making music in Arkanis was not exactly rebelling against, but everything they did not want to do because it felt false, somehow, They were trying to find something _else_. Something that spoke more to the rain and the smoke and the sooty brick buildings, more about trudging over the Blue Bridge to school and back and looking out your bedroom window at the suburban street and wanting _more_.

“All right,” Armitage said. “I have to go. Do you want to come with me?”

Ben shook his head. “I mean, I do, but I have — I think I’d be in the way.”

“Ben —”

“No, I’m not mad or anything. It’s just that I — I have to think.”

“All right.” Armitage stood. “I’ll ring you when I wrap this up. I expect that my editor will want me to write a retrospective. It shouldn’t take long.”

Ben took hold of Armitage’s hand, almost desperately. “Be careful.”

“Careful? It’s not going to be danger —” He broke off. “I will. I will be careful.”

“There was always something about his songs, you know?” Ben said. “They were beautiful but they made me feel so much dread.”

Armitage nodded and squeezed Ben’s hand. “I know.”

“So be careful. When you’ve seen into that kind of dark, seeing the example of someone who fell into it can make you want to face it again.”

Armitage smiled. “You’re very wise,” he said teasingly, but meaning it.

Ben bowed his head. “I’m not. I’m just scared.”

“Don’t be.”

Armitage bent his own head down so he could coax Ben’s back up with his lips. He felt Ben breath in, his chest expanding, drawing up to his full height. He returned the kiss, softly, and with an exhale, collapsed into Armitage, holding his arms around him. Armitage swayed momentarily but, astonished, found he could hold Ben’s weight.

“You’re stronger than you look,” Ben murmured into Armitage’s shoulder.

“Go on then,” Armitage said in an imitation of his mother. “But you’re right. Remember that.”

Ben stood back up and nodded. “OK. Yeah. I’ll be here, when you call later. I’m not going anywhere.”

Armitage leaned forward, kissed those moist, pouting lips again, and then left the room to join Phasma and Cassandra.

* * *

On the drive back to his house — between comforting the increasingly distraught Cassandra as well as Phasma, who burst out, panicked, “Arm, we have to take the self-terminator machine piece out of the show! Bloody hell, that would — or would it be better to leave it in? To not avoid the subject?” — Armitage thought about what he did not speak about to Ben. _The Wastes Murders_. If anyone wanted to find something dark in Arkanis, they should start with them.

When Armitage was seven, they children began disappearing. They were older than he was, old enough to be sent on errands alone or to roam on their own, exploring. They never came home from the store or never arrived at their grandparents’ house or had been lost in the crowd at the fair. There had been five in all, two girls, three boys.

Bridget had tried to keep the city’s worst fears from Armitage, but he had known something was terribly wrong. He and Cassandra, who was hardly more than a baby then, were no longer allowed to play out in the garden alone. On rare sunny days, they would sit gazing out the front room window. That was when Armitage had begun reading to Cassandra, as a way to pass the time. The first book he tackled was _The Little Prince_ , coming immediately across two words that he needed Bridget to help him decipher and were instantly sources of fascination: _magnificent_ and _constrictor_. More new words followed quickly: _abandoned, discouraged, exhausting_. These, from both their context in the book and their meanings, Armitage associated with his father. Brendol’s visits had grown more frequent as Armitage had, as he put it, “started to become a person.”

This was when Brendol began driving Armitage to school, since Bridget didn’t want him to walk or take the bus on his own. Brendol would hold forth on the subjects of discipline and hard work, and how the country had “gone to pot” since everyone had decided that England “owed them a living.” Armitage wasn’t happy with the arrangement. Personhood seemed more like a burden than a privilege.

Two years after the first disappearance, the abductors and — as everyone had feared — murderers had been found when their would-be victim, a boy of seventeen, had escaped and rung the police. They were a young working-class couple, barely older than Armitage was now — the young woman to lure the children, the man to capture and kill them. Their cold, hard faces looked out from newspapers as they confessed to ever more atrocities that Armitage only learned about a decade later. Police found the children’s bodies buried in the Wastes Moor that stretched from Arkanis’ east edge and nearly curved completely around it to the south. It was vast, but the shallow graves were just where the moors began, not too far from the highway that wound through.

By then, when he was nine, Armitage was afraid to go outside on his own. Everything about his world had shifted. He was aware of danger. He was aware that his father wanted him to be something that he was fairly certain he could not be. He was aware that somehow these two things were related.

He was aware of a darkness in Arkanis.

* * *

At home, Armitage, Cassandra, and Phasma went to his room and listened to _Unknown Pleasures_. They sat side-by-side on the bed, leaning against the wall, heads tipped back, eyes closed. As he listened to Ian Curtis’ voice, Ben’s baritone as he sang in New Republic came back to Armitage, but he shifted his thoughts away from it. He had a duty to hear the voice of the dead man, to bear witness.

The album opened with “Disorder.”

 _Disorder_ , Armitage thought. The word stood in sharp contrast with _First Order_. That was what his father demanded — order, hierarchy, discipline.

_Could these sensations make me feel the pleasures of a normal man?_

_Ah,_ thought Armitage, _there is what I am_ _not_ _. Normal. I am put together wrong. Disordered._

He had seen a psychiatrist the summer before, and that is what he had been told. He had major depressive disorder — not mere moods, not temporary reactions to circumstance. It would come cycling back every few months, and the disorder was permanent, a lifelong companion. _Disordered_ was a constant state. You could choose to live with it or you could choose not to live with it. Perhaps Ian Curtis had chosen not to live with it any longer.

But that wasn’t Armitage’s subject. His editor stressed that he was not to focus on aspects of the story that were, in his words, “tawdry.” This article was to be about the music. So Armitage took mental note of the lyrics, of the thrumming basslines, the slightly off-kilter drums, the guitar that reverberated behind it all, then came to the front of the sound as if appearing out of darkness.

There was a conceit there. The album was trying to tell him something, Armitage thought. It always had been, but he had been content until then to merely hear it, to work out the elements of its whole, but he realized now he had never let it penetrate. Even attending Joy Division concerts, watching Curtis twitch and flail, he had missed some essential despair — or he had purposely not let it touch him. His write-ups of those shows in _AMW_  seemed, as he thought back to them, strangely distant — it was as if he known he was witnessing something that he could not quite encompass with his mind, with his self.

Cassandra began crying quietly during “She’s Lost Control,” and when Armitage nudged her with his shoulder as if to say _I’m here_ , she turned and buried her face in his shoulder. Phasma reached across Armitage and squeezed Cassandra’s hand. But they said nothing, listening to the fading echoes of the dirge “I Remember Nothing” and holding the silence even after the needle was circling the inner edge of the record.

The album was just shy of 40 minutes. When trio had sat thinking for another 20, Armitage stood and crossed to his desk, and, without a word, sat down and began typing. He didn’t notice when Cassandra glanced at Phasma and they both slipped out of the room. His hands seemed separate living things as they tapped out words, the type bars and even the letters themselves becoming almost invisible — the words were clear in his mind; he didn’t need to see them take form on paper. Armitage poured out everything he had not been able to say about the music before — what it inspired and the suppressions it spoke about — and about the sight of an audience, enraptured and ecstatic as a young man pulled his heart from his chest and danced.

He was so lost in the images, in the sounds, in his own words, that he forgot to ring Ben.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've kind of broken the conceit of Arkanis by making it explicitly Manchester here, since that is where Joy Division was from and where Ian Curtis died, but I'll forgive myself. Armitage mentioned needing to review a new work by Joy Division in an earlier chapter — that was the _Licht und Blindheit_ single, which had "Atmosphere" (my favorite Joy Division song — those tom-toms! those chimes! those synth strings! Ian's voice!) on the A-side and "Dead Souls" on the B-side.
> 
> The Wastes Murders are, in reality, the Saddleworth Moors murders. Morrissey was haunted by them, and The Smiths' song "Suffer Little Children" is about the murdered children. I don't suggest looking up anything about these murders if you're sensitive, though. The details are very upsetting.
> 
> I'm contemplating a mood board for this chapter.
> 
> Hello to new subscribers! I'm so glad to have you with me on this journey.


	22. XXII - Arkanis, So Much to Answer For

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage forgot to call, so Ben pays him a visit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is from "Suffer Little Children" by The Smiths, but I’ve changed “Manchester” to Arkanis.

### Chapter 22

#### Arkanis, So Much to Answer For

> _In the end, we must remember that this is just that: an end. The lights going down, the curtain closing — our romantic memories of the performance do not change the ineluctable truth that there will be no new words written, no new songs sung in that melancholy baritone that enraptured so many. Joy Division’s songs may have been an expression of Ian Curtis’ demons, but those same demons consumed him; we are left not with the artifacts of a triumph nor the relics of a saint but with a life unfinished, of art unexpressed._

Ben read Armitage’s words in the latest edition of _AMW_ as he stood in the thin morning sunlight next to the newsstand. He had been the first there to get it, and befuddled factory managers and workers off the night shift looked at him curiously. Ben’s chest swelled with a kind of pride seeing Armitage’s byline — his name had never been published with his writing before. He must have worked all night on the article. Ian Curtis had died on Sunday, the word had gotten out on Monday, and here it was Wednesday morning, and _AMW_ was the first music weekly to cover the story.

Ben scanned back to the middle of the column, to reread something he hadn’t expected:

> _Ian and I spoke sometimes, in the way of people who cross paths often in the dim lights of bars and the fluorescent glare of record shops or even in the gray sunlight through bus windows, when we’d see each other scribbling furiously in notebooks and share a knowing look. He struck me as distant, the kind of person who felt that his presence in this dimension with other human beings was his misfortune as well as theirs._

Armitage had never mentioned this — not even when they had sat on his bed, talking of whatever passed through their minds. Ben knew he shouldn’t have been bothered by it, but it just reminded him of how much about Armitage was unknown to him. He shook his head at himself. It was stupid, it was greedy — like he wanted to swallow Armitage up and make everything about him a part of his own being.

Ben blushed at his own metaphor, thinking of Monday afternoon, when Armitage had seemed ready to do anything, give anything.

But he hadn’t been willing to believe Ben. The dread that Ben felt was real, even if Armitage had been right about it not coming from any supernatural source. It was just Arkanis itself.  Ben sighed, frustrated. He had tried to talk to Luke to make sense of it, but it had just made him more confused. He needed to talk to someone who understood Arkanis, who had lived there all his life and whose self was tied to it.

But Armitage hadn’t called. Ben agonized all Tuesday, forcing himself not to pick up his own phone — telling himself that Armitage was probably still working, or recovering from working, on his article. But here was the proof now that it was done. Surely he would call today.

Ben decided that he couldn’t wait to find out if he would. With an impatient huff, he folded the copy _AMW_ in half, tucked it in his leather jacket, and trotted to the bus stop.

* * *

By the Ben had knocked three times on Armitage’s front door, his thoughts were beginning to trip over each other. What if Armitage was home and didn’t want to see him? What if writing the article about the death of someone he knew had been too much? What if Armitage needed Ben’s help? Should he knock the door down?

Ben stood back from the door, looking to the back gate and wondering if he should try to go in through the kitchen, when there was a shuffle from inside the house, and the door opened.

Armitage stood squinting, hand on the knob. He wore plaid pajama bottoms and a white Siouxsie and the Banshees T-shirt.  “Ben?” he said softly.

“Yes, _Ben_. Maybe you forgot?” Ben replied, startling himself with the hint of a snarl in his voice.

Armitage shrunk back slightly, almost imperceptibly. But Ben was so attuned his movements that he saw it as clearly as if it were a fearful flinch, and he hated himself for it, but not enough for the anger that had built in his gut to dissipate.

“Ben, I’m sorry,” Armitage said. “I —”

“You didn’t call,” Ben said. “You said you’d call and then you didn’t.”

Armitage nodded. “I didn’t. I — the doctor —” He broke off. “Come in from out there.”

Ben stood, hands in his pockets, for a moment.

“Please,” Armitage said, stepping aside to make room.

Ben scowled but then slunk into the house, as if that weren’t what he had wanted in the first place. Only once he was inside the dim sitting room, glaring at the brown carpet, did he realize what Armitage had started to say.

“What about the doctor?” Ben said. He whirled back to Armitage, his eyes roving over his features. He was pale, with bluish circles under his eyes. Ben took in the way Armitage stood at a distance, eyeing Ben warily. “You’re sick,” he said. “I’m such an idiot. Is it the — the —”

“The concussion,” Armitage said. “The doctor came back ‘round to follow up on her first visit after my mum rung the surgery. She was none too pleased. She ordered me to bed again.”

Ben crossed over to Armitage in two long strides, wanting to cradle his face in his hands, to kiss his eyelids. But Armitage seemed so delicate, and he shifted away from Ben’s oncoming form. Ben internally cursed at himself.

“Why did your mom call the doctor?” he asked.

“After I turned in my article, she and Cass tried to talk to me and when I answered I didn’t make sense — I was slurring words, they said. I don’t remember. It seems I overstimulated myself over the past couple of days. I didn’t tell the doctor it was an excitable American boy that did it.”

Ben smirked. “Sorry about that. And sorry about… about being mad. It was stupid.” He ventured to grab the ends of Armitage’s fingertips. “What about — the other stuff, your article — I read it — I didn’t know you knew him personally, and I — are you OK? Are you here by yourself?”

And it was Armitage who reached out with his free right hand then and touched Ben’s face, sliding his fingers from his cheekbone to the corner of his mouth, tugging there slightly.

“I’m all right. I’ve been deemed well enough to be on my own,” he said quietly. “It’s all dreadfully sad. I worry that it will color everything that comes out of Arkanis, musically speaking, anyway. But I keep thinking of the time —” Armitage fluttered his eyelashes down, shading his eyes, and dropped his hand to rest it lightly on Ben’s chest. “The time he and I were sitting at the bar in the Cog and Wheel, both of us nursing an ale and scribbling. We caught each other’s eye and he said, kind of teasing — ‘Hey, mate — I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.’”

Ben’s posture stiffened for a moment.

“Our writing, Ben,” Armitage gently, taking Ben’s other hand and squeezing.

Ben dropped his head and laughed breathily. “Oh. Yeah. Yeah, sorry.”

“So we exchanged notebooks. I’ll never forget — his said, ‘Mother, I tried, please believe me. I’m doing the best that I can.’”

“And what did yours say?”

Armitage licked his lips. “It was all rather — well, mine said, ‘Oh mother, I can feel the soil falling over my head.’ We looked at each other, after we handed our notebooks back to each other, and we didn’t say anything about it. But there was a recognition.”

They were silent for a moment.

“It doesn’t mean that you — that what he did —” Ben began.

“No, I know,” Armitage said. “But maybe that’s why I never really let their music in. I was harsh on their performances — I was judging them the way I’d judge myself, wanting everything to be perfect. I knew there was something he and I shared, and I didn’t want to admit it. And what if I hadn’t been such a judgmental arsehole — what if I’d taken that moment in the bar and said, ‘Yeah, mate, you’re not alone with this shite’?”

Armitage leaned his forehead against Ben’s, closing his eyes. Ben kept his open, focusing on the nearness of Armitage’s skin, the texture of his lips, the curve of his throat.

“How do you do that?” Ben asked.

“Do what,” Armitage whispered.

“You can take how you’re feeling and trace it — it’s like one of those cartoon maps with the footprints that show where a character has been. You can follow where a feeling has been through your thoughts.”

Ben dragged his fingertips up Armitage’s arm as he spoke, ending just beneath his shirt sleeve, where his skin was smooth and warm. He nudged his lips against Armitage’s and for a moment, they forgot the question in their kiss.

“We all have our talents, I suppose,” Armitage said, smiling, when they parted.

“You shouldn’t feel guilty, though,” Ben said. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I don’t feel guilty, exactly. I wish I knew how different choices would lead to different outcomes, though.”

“Sometimes my uncle talks about that. Like, whenever you have a choice to make, you can picture time branching out in different directions — all the different ways things could have gone. It’s supposed to help me not just _do_ things, to think about what will happen first.”

“Tell your uncle that way madness lies. It’s the story of my life, and it’s exhausting.”

Ben remembered suddenly, and broke away. “You’re supposed to be resting,” he said.

“And yet I keep getting up and shuffling about the house. I could use some help staying in bed.”

Armitage smirked, and Ben’s gut leaped. He swallowed hard and then drew in a shuddering breath. “I’m bigger than you, so I’m pretty sure I can keep you there. But I mean it — you’re resting. No talking.”

“We don’t have to talk.”

“Sshh.”

Ben put his index finger against Armitage’s lips. Armitage nipped at them.

“And _no biting_.”

“What are you, a monk?”

“Armitage.”

“What?”

“Really, I want you to get better. If the doctor says you need to rest, you need to rest.”

Armitage leaned forward, pressing his slender chest against Ben’s broad one. “Oh yes?”

Ben smirked now, holding Armitage’s gaze for a moment as it became clear that they both knew what his intentions were. And then, without a word, he hauled Armitage over his shoulder and carried him up the stairs. He was all too aware of the slimness of Armitage’s thighs as he wrapped his arms around them, shocked at the ease of carrying his slight weight. Armitage remained obediently silent as Ben brought him to his room and lay him on the bed, first having to move push a notebook, a pack of cigarettes, and a slim book called _Sailing to Byzantium_ onto the floor. Armitage watched as Ben arranged him on the pillow and slid the slippers off his feet. Then Ben lay down next to him, facing him with his arm draped across his shoulder. When Armitage tried to shift toward him to kiss, Ben shook his head and lightly held him down.

“Rest,” he whispered.

Armitage frowned, his eyes still on Ben, clear and green and so utterly _offended_ Ben almost laughed. Instead he looked at him, mock-stern, and then placed the tip of his index finger on each of Armitage’s eyelids in turn.

“Close them,” he said, and Armitage did.

Ben’s body was aching from Armitage’s gaze, but he was determined to be in control of it. It was always the same — a feeling would overcome him, and everything he did after that point would be in service to it, whether it was writing a song or pushing his body against the beautiful man whose bed he somehow was lying in. His uncle warned him against it — “Impulse control, Ben,” he’d say. “You might accomplish what you want better if you _don’t rush into it_.”

So Ben looked at Armitage’s closed eyelids now — pinkish, with spidery veins of blue and red, yellowish where the bruise on his left temple extended. They quivered as his eyes beneath them moved slightly. His thick, feathery lashes rested on the darkened circles beneath his eyes.

“You’re so tired,” Ben whispered.

“I am, but I can’t sleep,” Armitage said. “Talk to me.”

“You’re supposed to have quiet.”

“Then talk quietly.”

Armitage’s breath was warm on Ben’s cheek. He wanted to kiss those closed eyelids, the curved pink lips. But he didn’t. He thought of his anger, earlier, the way Armitage had drawn slightly away from him. That’s what came of following his impulses. It usually meant that he would need to be forgiven for something.

So he decided he would do as Armitage asked, no more.

“What should I talk about?”

Armitage’s voice was barely above a whisper when he said, “Tell me about this darkness that is in Arkanis.”

“Oh. Well.” Ben tried to collect his thoughts, but he knew they wouldn’t fall into place until he started talking, so he took a breath. “I said that it felt like there was _something_ dark in Arkanis — but I guess that’s not quite right. It’s not like a _thing_. It’s a _feeling_. Like… people aren’t happy. When Cass came to see me, there were these men outside a house who bothered her —” Ben felt Armitage’s body tense and regretted mentioning it, but he had to go on now. “They bothered her, but she was OK. And I — well, I took care of them. But I felt that from them, you know? That darkness. Like they had nothing they wanted in life. And then there’s people like you and Cass and Phasma — and me, I guess, but I’m not from here — you want everything out of life, but you can’t get it in Arkanis, and yet you don’t want to leave, even if you think you do want to leave. And then people like your father — they want everything to stay the same to keep working like they always worked. Always the same, like the weather here, you know? But everybody's changing and the city, the guts of it, aren’t. It can’t keep up. And so everyone is hurting somehow. That’s what’s dark.”

“ _Mad Ireland hurt you into poetry_ ,” Armitage murmured.

“What?”

“ _Now Ireland has her madness and her weather still, for poetry makes nothing happen_ … _It is a way of happening, a mouth_.” Armitage fluttered his eyes open. “Auden — ‘In Memory of W.B. Yeats.’ They both were poets,” he added when Ben looked at him, puzzled. “One English, one Irish. The Irish one is the dead one. Well, _was._ They’re both dead now.”

“Oh, your mother said something about Irish people and poetry — or being good with words, anyway.”

“It’s my heritage as well as my curse,” Armitage said.

“It’s _my_ curse right now,” Ben said, smiling. “Because you’re supposed to be resting, not talking.”

Armitage snaked his slender arms around Ben’s waist and nestled his face against his chest. “All right, have it your way,” he said.

With Armitage’s breath against him, his light copper hair tickling his chin, with a warmth stirring in his belly and a twinge between his legs that he was doing his best to control, Ben focused on his impulses — the anger that had manifested in a power that had terrified as much as exhilarated him. When he was a kid, he used to think that it rained because he was sad. His mother had laughed and said, “Oh, it just feels like that sometimes, Ben. And sometimes it’s the rain that makes us feel sad.”

But was that really it? Ben shook his head slightly, trying to clear the thought. Here in Arkanis, there would be no way of knowing if the rain originated from him or the atmosphere — it rained too often. But what Ben had done to Brendol — that was real. He had felt the power flowing through him, as if coming up from the ground under his feet, through the air touching his skin. He had felt it, too, when he had fought off the men who harassed Cassandra. Both times there had been almost a pleasure in it. He had wanted to feel _more_ — the connection to some sort of force that was infinite and powerful, something that he alone could feel and use. But now — lying here, with Armitage’s arms around him, he feared it. He feared losing control, of destroying the fragile trust that he had built with this beautiful man to whom the same force had drawn him. Armitage was worth fighting for, and to keep him Ben knew that he would have to fight himself.


	23. XXIII - This Night Has Opened My Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's the night of Armitage and Phasma's art show, but something about it shakes Ben.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is that of The Smiths song of the same name.
> 
> Sorry about the wait! I've been sick with an unconquerable sinus infection, bah!

### Chapter 23

#### This Night Has Opened My Eyes

Phasma and Armitage decided to keep their Self-Terminator in their Impossible Machines show, the last piece in the sequence. There were twelve machines in all. Phasma had drawn each, in blueprint form, to First Order Manufacturing specifications and Armitage had written their accompanying technical descriptions conforming to First Order standards. There were no other artists’ notes for the pieces. This too had been a mutual decision, but it didn’t keep Phasma from casting glances during the reception to gauge people’s reactions while she sipped champagne.

Their gallery space was a narrow walkway behind a colonnade within a larger gallery in one of the Academy’s old buildings, a neo-gothic edifice with pointed arched windows and curved glass panes set in the ceiling. The space itself had parquet floors and ornately carved arches around the double doors. The setting contrasted strangely with the industrial aesthetic of their pieces, but in a way that Phasma and Armitage both found suited the exhibit. People were making their way up and down the wall, looking at each piece, not yet settled in to small talk, picking at finger food, and quaffing down the wine. Most were other students from the Academy, but Armitage recognized another writer for _AMW_ , a nervous young man with dark hair and the unlikely name Dopheld Mitaka.

“Do you think they understand?” Phasma asked Armitage as they tried to lounge in an unconcerned way on a black leather couch against the wall after the final piece. Phasma hid her apprehension well. She was glittering darkly in a silver lamé cocktail dress with a black netting overlay, patent leather stilettos that made her tower over everyone, and blood-red lips. “That they see the connection what the machines do and the actual machines — the First Order ones?”

“You can’t be too concerned about what your work does once it’s in other people’s heads, Phasma,” Armitage said. He took a swig from his bottle of ale, watching the door.

“What a strange thing for a critic to say,” she replied.

“Well, that’s the thing — I think it’s time for me to get out of the critic business and into the creating one.”

“Finally. Bravo.”

“Don’t act smug,” Armitage said. “It was difficult to make the decision to deprive Arkanis of my penetrating insight.”

Phasma snorted, nearly choking on her champagne. “Seems you’re more concerned about what’s going to penetrate that door,” she said.

Armitage’s cheeks lit up with two spots of deep pink. There was no point in hiding his anxiousness. “Ben and Cass are supposed to be here soon. I’m a bit unsettled, I admit.”

“What is that to be nervous about?” Phasma said, flashing her white teeth. “Your sister is a brat but she adores you, and your boyfriend is an impossibly gorgeous specimen of the male sex.”

“That’s just it,” Armitage said, trying to maintain his languorous posture. “ _Is_ he my boyfriend? It’s all so undefined.”

“ _Is he my boyfriend?_ ” Phasma said in a mocking tone. “He fussed over you like a mother hen the whole time you were getting over your concussion and he can’t take his eyes off you. And do you recall that I saw him drag your fucking father across ten feet of gravel using only his mind? Is he your boyfriend. Jesus, Arm.”

Armitage chewed his bottom lip. “I still can’t quite believe that happened — even though you and Cass saw it.”

“It wasn’t just seeing it,” Phasma said. She drained her glass. “I could _feel_ something — like static electricity, almost.”

“It makes me wonder,” Armitage said, his eyes still on the door, “whether I should be afraid of him.”

“That depends,” Phasma said. “Are you an _idiot_?”

Armitage watched the procession of people. They leaned toward the pieces, reading the text. He didn’t want to tell Phasma about the moment when Ben’s voice briefly registered anger at him, when his eyes were dark with hurt. But Ben had conquered that darkness, hadn’t he? It was like the flip of a switch — he had gone from scowling to affectionate concern. But the quickness was part of what worried Armitage — could he trust someone so volatile, so mercurial? It had been a misunderstanding, but what would happen when it was not? When Armitage inevitably fucked something up — if he forgot to ring because he was too caught up in his writing or didn’t go out because a wave of anxiety kept him from leaving his room — what would Ben do then? Armitage tried to put aside his uneasiness.

“Look, Arm,” Phasma said, giving him a nudge with her shoulder, “I know you have every reason to be cautious, but it doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy something for once.”

Armitage shook his head, then took another swig from his bottle. “He acts as if he’s untouchable. And maybe _he_ is, but I’m not.”

“Hmm,” Phasma said.

“Hmm?” Armitage repeated.

“You’re right,” Phasma said. She shifted on the sofa to nudge his shoulder with her own. “But if I had _that_? It wouldn’t be my brain making the decisions.”

With her pronunciation of _that_ , Phasma jutted her chin in the direction of the entrance of the gallery, smirking mischievously. Ben and Cass had just walked in. Cass was dressed for going out in a short black skirt and a huge gray sweater that Armitage recognized as one of his own. And then there was Ben, just behind her as she bounded over once she spotted Armitage and Phasma. He wore his leather jacket over a red T-shirt and walked through the crowd with the same unstudied ease, stepping around groups that drifted into his path, never having to turn his wide shoulders to avoid brushing into someone. Ben’s face lit up in a grin when he saw Armitage and he picked up his pace to catch up with Cassandra. Ben was graceful for his height, but Armitage could imagine how menacing he would look if he had been approaching in anger rather than affection. But he put the image out of his head.

 _It’s Brendol_ , he thought. _All those years of enduring him have done this to you._

That was more of the darkness in Arkanis.

 _But not Ben,_ Armitage told himself. _He’s not part of that._

As Ben walked over, the waves of his hair bounced lightly. Armitage stood, nervously, unsure of how to greet him. In the days of his recovery, he and Ben had lay together on his bed, nestled like spoons, their fingers interlaced. Their lips had found each other’s often, quietly — careful now that they had the time and freedom for it. As Ben got nearer, Armitage’s palms tingled — he had wanted to let his hands rove all over Ben’s skin, but he had been holding back. Both of them had. After the day in Ben’s room, they were restrained. A death had come between them, a reminder of the shadow Ben felt over the city and of Armitage’s brushes with despair. There was something fragile about the world, and they were afraid to jostle reality. Who knew how easily it might break.

Cassandra had no such qualms. She checked Armitage with her shoulder when she reached him while Ben stood behind her, his hands in his pockets.

“Look at all these people!” she cried, grabbing Armitage and Phasma by their arms and shaking them. “I’m so excited for you two!”

“Steady on, Cass,” Armitage muttered. “People are starting to look.”

“Well, why wouldn’t they?” Cassandra said. “You’re the artists! Why aren’t people coming over here to pay tribute?”

She mock-glared around the room, hands on her hips.

“Right then, hot shot,” Phasma said, tucking her arm under Cassandra’s. “Let’s leave the boys to it, shall we? I’ll show you all the pieces.”

Both young women gave Ben and Armitage grins over their shoulders as they walked away. Armitage raised his eyes to meet Ben’s. He felt as he had done on the first day they had met, tongue-tied, unsure of, where to put his hands. But Ben knew where to put his. He crossed to Armitage with one long stride and enclosed Armitage’s waist in his palms, resting them lightly on his hips.

“Hey,” Ben said, drawing Armitage closer.

Armitage dropped his gaze away from Ben’s. “Erm, hello,” he said.

He was afraid to look up, afraid to see dozens of pairs of eyes looking at them, knowing. Someone who knew someone who knew his father would see, and then Brendol would _know_ , truly know what he suspected all along, and he’d use it to hurt Armitage somehow. To hurt Bridget and Cassandra. The papers from the lawyers weren’t all finalized — he could have them changed, he could refuse to sign at the last moment — he —

“Hey,” Ben said again. He squeezed slightly, his fingers in Armitage’s flesh, and Armitage fought his desire to press fully against him. “Don’t worry. Your thoughts are racing around like mine usually do.”

Armitage let his eyes rise once more, but only to look at Ben’s face. The rest of the room could have stopped existing, for all he cared.

“You can read my thoughts now?” he said quietly, teasingly.

“I can’t _read_ them, but I can _feel_ them. They’re —” Ben smiled, making Armitage want to kiss the creases in the corners of his mouth — “quieter now.”

“You’re helping,” Armitage said.

“Good.”

And before he could think too much about it, Armitage leaned forward, rose slightly onto his toes, and kissed Ben. Just a light touch of their lips, the briefest warmth, but enough for Armitage to wonder at the fullness of Ben’s mouth all over again, to take in the scent of his skin. Ben grinned even wider when they parted from the kiss, his cheeks glowing with a rare blush.

“Sorry,” Armitage said.

“Don’t be.” Ben leaned forward and brushed the tip of Armitage’s nose with his own. “Will you show me all the drawings?”

“Of course,” Armitage said, but he felt the same rush of trepidation as when Ben asked him to sing. He took a breath.

Ben grabbed his hand and headed off in the direction of the first piece. “Good!”

Armitage let Ben lead him along the wall and stood shifting from foot to foot as Ben studied each drawing and read the accompanying texts. Phasma’s drawings were large, done on actual blueprint paper, and Armitage watched as Ben’s eyes traced every line, studying the machines as if to determine how they would look in action and reading the descriptions written in Armitage’s block lettering. Ben said nothing, though, his expression intensely focused — his face art in its own way, Armitage thought.

Only when they reached the final piece, the Self-Terminator, did Ben’s face betray more emotion. He furrowed his dark brows as he stood in front of it. After a few minutes, Armitage brushed Ben’s fingers lightly with his own.

“What is it? Do you not approve?”

Ben shook his head. “You and Phasma — you made something about Arkanis — the darkness. Some of the machines make what people here long for, right? Poetry and music and flowers and color. And the others — they’re what you fear, groupthink and suicide and ordinariness and violence. Right?”

Armitage smiled slightly. Ben was smart, probably more than most people gave him credit for. They saw the tall, broad boy who was often silent but rambled when he chose to talk, but they didn’t consider the fast-moving mind behind his dark, sweet eyes.

Those eyes darkened slightly now; Armitage could see in them that Ben was turning his gaze inward.

“I’m part of it,” Ben said.

“Part of what?”

“The darkness — this.” Ben gestured at Phasma’s drawing of the Violence Repeater.

“Ben, that’s not so. You’re music and warmth and sweetness,” Armitage said, moving closer to speak softly.

Ben shook his head and his hair brushed Armitage’s lips.

“I thought of those guys — the ones who were bothering Cass when I saw it, but then I realized — it’s me, too. _I_ fought with those guys. And I liked it. And your father, I — I —” Ben held out his hand toward the wall, curling his fingers. “I did _that_ , and if nobody had stopped me, I —”

The frame that held the drawing began to rattle on the wall.

“I don’t know what I would have done,” Ben said, d. “It’s almost as if I can see it around me now — like a shadow that I cast —”

Ben dropped his hand, but the frame continued to shake, and the air tingled on Armitage’s skin — the way the fuzzy layer of static on the TV screen felt when he held his hand up to it as a child. His father had explained it to him, he remembered unexpectedly. That was back when Armitage had wanted his father’s approval, when he thought there still was a chance that he might get it. He had sat on the floor and listened carefully, but his father had frowned at him and said, “I don’t expect you understood any of that, though.” And it was true, he hadn’t understood. It was something to do with electrons and phosphors. Charged phosphors.

Ben took a step back from the wall, bumping into Mitaka. Ben turned quickly to apologize, brushing Mitaka with his shoulder. Mitaka tottered and might have fallen — Ben was much bigger than him — if Armitage hadn’t grabbed him by the shoulder and righted him. The frame stopped rattling as Ben looked down at the small dark-haired man and then at Armitage. His face was more troubled than Armitage had ever seen it — his brows drawn together, his full lips on the verge of trembling. In his eyes, though, was something like rage that quickly gave way to pain.

“I — I’m sorry — I — I forgot, I promised my uncle I was — I was going to do something for him. I have to go.”

Ben turned toward the door, but Armitage, after first giving a reassuring nod to the somewhat shaken Mitaka, went after him.

“What could your uncle have wanted you do that can’t wait until tomorrow?” Armitage asked.

Ben moved through the crowd with long strides, his sense of where to step in order to not bump into anyone having returned after the collision with Mitaka.

“It’s important,” Ben said. “I was supposed to do it earlier today and forgot.”

“He’ll understand,” Armitage said, trying to catch Ben by the hand as they walked.

“ _No_ ,” Ben said, almost shouting, “I mean, sorry, no, I don’t want to disappoint him — I’m sorry — tell Phasma I really liked it — I have to go.”

“Ben, please —”

But Ben trotted through a group of people just coming through the door, and Armitage watched his tall figure as he ran down the corridor and into the stairwell. He considered running after him, but his feet felt rooted to the spot. This was _his_ moment, his and Phasma’s. Armitage wouldn’t leave. Ben’s excuse about the errand was obviously made up. No, the reason he left had to do with the shaking frame, the charged air. Ben’s talk about his shadow — clearly he had come to some conclusion in the chaotic web of his reasoning.

Armitage bowed his head, squared his shoulders. When he lifted his chin again he responded to the enquiring look Cass and Phasma gave him with a casual shrug. But they both looked concerned rather than placated in response. Armitage noticed, as if outside of himself, that he was trembling — trembling like the frame against the wall had when it was under Ben’s influence.

Because that’s what it had been. Phasma had told him what it felt like.

He squeezed his eyes shut, tried to block out the low buzz of chatter around him. _Should I be afraid of him?_

But Ben was afraid of himself.

When Armitage opened his eyes, Phasma was standing next to him, holding a glass of champagne out to him.

“Fortify yourself,” she said. “And then go after him.”

Armitage took the glass and quickly drained it.


	24. XXIV - God, How Sex Implores You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Can you guess from the chapter title?
> 
> Please read the content notes below!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The sexual content of this chapter may be more explicit than what some people consider appropriate for the "teen" rating. I used my best judgment in descriptions to try to keep from being prurient.
> 
> The title of this chapter is from “Stretch Out and Wait” by The Smiths.

### Chapter 24

#### Take Me to the Haven of Your Bed

Armitage ran. The central hall of the gallery building was dark, and his footsteps rang on the marble floors. He pushed through the heavy carved doors onto the sidewalk and debated his choices. The nearest bus stop was across Angels Square, but would Ben have gone there? Or would he have started on the trek to his flat, three miles off? It would be like Ben to do that — all impulse, damn the rain.

Because it _was_ raining, of course, though only half-heartedly now, dusting Armitage’s coat with droplets as he crossed the street. He squinted through the reflections of street lamps on the wet pavement and made out Ben’s tall figure, standing beneath a small gazebo in the square’s garden. Ben had his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket and his shaggy head was bowed as he paced slowly.

Armitage stopped running and skirted around the gazebo so that Ben would see him before he approached — as if Ben were a wild animal he didn’t want to scare off. Ben raised his head before Armitage came into his line of sight, though, then turn in his direction.

“Ben,” Armitage said.

“Come here,” Ben said quietly. “Get out of the rain.”

Armitage obeyed but stood at a distance once he was under the shelter of the gazebo. The scent of wet leather from Ben’s jacket hung in the air between them.

“It’s OK,” Ben said. “I’m not — I’m not dangerous or anything. Not to you. Not directly.”

Armitage shook his head. “What do you mean, ‘not directly’? Ben, please —”

Ben’s face was pained, contorted in the chiaroscuro of night and streetlamps. “You feel it, I can tell — you wonder if you should be afraid of me. No,” he cut in as Armitage began to protest. “You should wonder. But, Armitage, I told you. I told you about the shadow, about the dark in Arkanis. I’m starting to think....”

Armitage didn’t want to ask. Deep in his gut, he knew what the answer would be. But, shakily, he did: “Think what?”

Ben swallowed. “That I should leave. Go back to New York.”

Ben raised his big hands, signaling _stop_ , as Armitage made a sound in his throat that was between a choke and a shout.

“I don’t want to,” Ben said. His eyes shone in the dark, his lower lip was full and pushed out, and Armitage longed to kiss him.

So he did. He slid his hands under Ben’s leather jacket, against the warmth of Ben’s body, and pulled him close. Their mouths met in a hunger stronger than any they had shared before, teeth on flesh, lips parting, Ben’s tongue hot and firm and tasting of rain and ale. Ben’s hands were on Armitage’s hips, and then his own hips replaced his hands, and they were lost in the warmth of each other’s bodies as the stood in the cold night air.  In the euphoria of the kiss, of Ben pressed against him, their want meeting, tears welled in Armitage’s eyes, and a moan escaped from his throat, which Ben seemed to capture in his own mouth and return. In all of the snatched kisses, the hesitant caresses of his past, Armitage had never know anything like this — there was nothing like this, he was certain. Even if he kissed another boy under a gazebo in the rainy moonlight, even if that boy’s mouth was warm and his hands were large — even then, it could never be like this, because there was no one else like Ben Solo.

When they parted it was for Armitage to gulp down air and gasp out, “I don’t want you to, either.” He cradled Ben’s jaw in both his hands, his thumbs on Ben’s moist lips. “Stay here. There’s no reason for you to leave.”

Ben shook his head, and his hair brushed against the backs of Armitage’s hands. “You saw it,” he whispered, his deep voice husky. “What did your description say? ‘ _A self-repeating generator, powered by violent acts that unleash the potential energy of previous acts of violence’_? You and Phasma both know it’s in Arkanis. I feed that machine.”

Armitage couldn't think of how to answer, so he simply whispered, “No, Ben,” and then kissed him again.

Ben pulled away sharply, his mouth moist.

“What? What is it?” Armitage asked, grasping for Ben’s hands, afraid that if Ben went now he’d never see him again.

“I —” Ben began, and this his cheeks went scarlet and he looked away. “I mean, there’s no one home at my place. My uncle is at some kind of meditation conference-slash-archeology expedition on the Isle of Wight.”

Ben lifted his eyes back to Armitage — they were bright, hopeful, anxious. A tremor started in Armitage’s gut as he realized what Ben meant.

“Should we —” Ben said — “should we go there?”

Armitage leaned forward, resting his forehead against Ben’s cheek. “Yes,” he whispered into his skin. “Yes, please, let’s go there.”

* * *

Armitage didn’t dare hold Ben’s hand on the bus ride, nor on the walk to Ben’s building — didn’t dare nuzzle his face into Ben’s hair or place is lips on his neck. But the instant the doors closed on the elevator, he took Ben by the hips and pulled him close. Ben pushed back, until Armitage’s back was against the elevator doors and their mouths were pressed together, warm and hungry, their breath and the slide of their lips on each other’s the only sound in the small space.

When the doors opened, Ben caught him up in his arms to keep him from falling through, and they staggered through the empty hallway to the door of Ben’s flat. Ben fumbled with his keys as Armitage wound his arms around him, his palms flush against his skin beneath Ben’s shirt. Six months before, Armitage never could have imagine acting with such abandonment — it wasn’t even brazen; it was completely natural, to touch Ben, to kiss him, to want him.

Impossible to have imagined this — Ben tugged off his own leather jacket, then Armitage’s wool coat, and then pushed Armitage back into one of the bean bags on the floor in the sitting room. He kneeled between Armitage’s open knees, kissing him harder all the while, their mouths opening, tongues exploring lips. Ben tasted of rain and hops, and his skin smelled like nothing Armitage had ever experienced — warmth and leather and musk and salt.

Ben held himself up with his elbows on the bean bag to keep Armitage from having to bear his whole weight. But still Armitage felt his size, Ben’s broad shoulders where they covered him, Ben’s powerful legs against his own. And he felt — a rush, a push, a gasp — Armitage felt Ben’s arousal against him, a throb that drew him to writhe against Ben, their chests pushed harder against each other’s, everything existing in the pressure of bodies and the sound of breath. Armitage returned the pulse of want and groaned into Ben’s kiss.

He felt Ben’s mouth curve into a smile. A rumble in Ben’s throat was the reply, and then Ben’s weight was off of him as those big hands worked at the buttons of Armitage’s shirt. Once it was open, he placed his palm on Armitage’s bare skin, smiling with wet lips, panting, his eyes glazed with desire.

Just the sight of him sent a surge of pleasure through Armitage — more than the rare instances when he took himself in hand. That was a necessary alleviation he thought, though. This was different — this was no furtive tugging beneath his duvet. This was something he wanted to happen _now, now_ — but also that he wanted to experience forever.

With a dive of his head, Ben’s lips were on Armitage’s chest. Armitage gasped as he recognized the slight rasp of a tongue against his sternum. Ben paused and raised his eyes to Armitage in a way that made his hips buck involuntarily, grinding his crotch into Ben’s, seeking out that firmness, that heat.

“Is this OK?” Ben asked. “Can I?”

Ben opened his mouth, tongue poised above Armitage’s pink nipple. Armitage could only nod silently — until Ben’s mouth made contact with his sensitive flesh and then he moaned out, “Oh Christ, Ben, oh god.”

Ben doubled his efforts, sucking the nipples sliding his fingers around it as he moved his mouth to the other. Armitage was fully writhing, his hands moving from Ben’s hips to grip the sculpted muscles of his arse, pulling him closer as he grinded into him.

Ben’s mouth moved lower now, kissing the smooth skin of Armitage’s chest, down the trail of downy hair, light like his eyelashes, that led beneath the waistband of his jeans.

“Ben, wait!” Armitage managed to gasp.

This time when Ben raised his eyes, there was something impatient rather than entreating in them, but he breathed in deeply.

“You want me to stop,” he said, not asked.

“Yes,” Armitage said. “No. I mean — not here, please. Not on this ridiculous thing.” He smiled wanly, punching lightly into the beanbag. “I mean. Take me to your room. Please.”

Ben grinned. “I like the way you say _room_ ,” he said, imitating Armitage’s accent, the Northern vowels of it coming out in this moment of abandon. “And the way you say _please._ ”

Armitage smiled back. “Then _please, please, please_ take me to your bed, Ben.”

Ben stood and pulled Armitage up by his elbows and into a kiss in one fluid motion.

“I’ve never heard anything as good as those words,” Ben said. “Not any music, any song.”

Seemingly unwilling to relinquish the contact of their bodies, Ben steered Armitage while walking backwards down the hall, unbuckling Armitage’s belt as they went. Armitage’s efforts to pull off Ben’s T-shirt kept him from unbuttoning the fly, too.

But when they got to Ben’s room, and Ben had guided Armitage to the bed, and lay him down, and then himself between Armitage’s legs as he continued the kisses down Armitage’s belly, then he paused and asked “Can I? Can I see you?”

Armitage breathed out _yes_. He never thought his own “manhood,” as his mother’s romance novels put it, so impressive — but now he was surprised at the strength of his want for Ben to see him. When Ben had the buttons undone and his hands were tugging at the waistband, Armitage managed to say what else he wanted.

“I want to see you too,” he burst out. “All of you. Even if we — if we don’t — I want to know that you let me see how beautiful you are.”

Ben’s cheeks reddened. “I don’t know about beautiful — not the way you are. I’m — don’t be — I’m —”

Armitage interrupted Ben’s stammered speech by sitting up and sliding out of his jeans himself. His erect penis bobbed as he drew the elastic waistband of his briefs over it, pale and pinkish as the rest of him, and as smooth too.

Ben’s eyes widened, fixed for a moment, and his wet lips parted as he took a shuddering breath. Then he was on his feet, scrambling out of his own jeans, and when he was out, Armitage let out an involuntary whimper.

Ben ducked his head. “That’s what I meant — don’t be — you probably could have guessed from — ah — earlier — but I’m — it’s kind of embarrassing — really, but —”

“Jesus, Ben,” Armitage gasped out. “Oh Christ,  you’re lovely.”

“You think so? I think, we’ll, I’m too —”

“Too big?” Armitage yelped out, unthinking. “Christ, no, fuck. You’re perfect.”

In the light from the dim bedside lamp, Armitage saw that Ben was circumcised, the dark swell of his erection exposed, the whole length of him curving slightly upward, the girth making Armitage blush at his own desire to take it in his hand. He forced himself to put that want aside to take in the rest of Ben, actually standing and circling him. His his skin had a warm paleness in the light, dotted with dark moles, smooth over the muscles of his back, the deep groove of his spine. Blood rushed to Armitage’s cheeks as he regarded Ben’s buttocks, the strong curve of them. He circled back in front of Ben, suddenly shy, wanting to touch Ben but unsure where to begin, what to do.

Before he could decide, though, Ben had pushed Armitage down onto the bed was straddling his hips on the bed, kissing him until he reclined fully. He retraced the path his mouth had taken earlier, but this time he had his fingertips resting lightly in the thatch of ginger hair between Armitage’s legs. With his other hand, he stroked Armitage’s pale, slender thigh.

Ben raised his head once more, his brown eyes lit up with desire. “I don’t have anything here — you know, for doing anything, so if you don’t want to go farther, I understand —”

Armitage laughed through his breathing, which was coming faster. “I don’t have so much pride that I can’t tell you I have never done this before, and if it’s the same for you, then —”

Ben’s face lit up. “It’s the same for me,” he said. “Do you mean, I can — can I?”

In response, Armitage put his hand over Ben’s, and drew it to touch him. Ben’s eyes lit up with eagerness, closing his hand around Armitage and, carefully, with slight pressure, stroking upward.

Armitage groaned out, “Oh fuck!” before he knew the words were in his throat. “I thought you said you never —”

Ben blushed. “I have a lot of practice — you know, on myself.”

Armitage nodded and a wicked thought sprung to his lips without pausing in his mind. “Have you ever — ah, god — ever because of me?”

“Of course,” Ben said, guileless. “All those times we made out without — well, it was the first thing I did when I was alone afterward.”

Armitage smiled, imagining this — Ben’s large form reclined on this small bed they were on now, that impressive erection in his hand, the muscles in his forearm as he stroked — bunching and releasing as they did now.

“I don’t want —“” Armitage said — “I don’t want to finish without touching you, too.”

“I want you to touch me,” Ben said, looking at him openly, his beautiful face too open to hide his need.

“Come here,” Armitage said. “Kneel down. Facing me. I think —”

Armitage drew himself nearer to Ben, hardly pausing to consider the contrast between them except to appreciate it, and then finally, finally — putting his pale slender hand on Ben’s erection, the skin smoother than he could have imagined, even on the scar from the circumcision.

Ben’s eyes widened as Armitage then took them both in hand, the lengths of them touching, the head of Ben’s penis sinking into Armitage’s pubic hair nudging into the soft flesh.  Ben gasped and Armitage laughed as he tried to encompass them both.

“I need your help,” he whispered. “My hand is too small.”

Ben nodded, and then put his broad hand around them, trembling slightly, his eyes fixed on the sight of their arousals pressed against each other.

“I think, if we —” Armitage gave an experimental motion with his hips, and his breath caught in his throat at the moment Ben’s did.

There was a fumbling of hands then, each trying to grab at the other’s skin as they thrust into each other. Their mouths locked, their free hands exploring whatever flesh they could find. Ben’s strong fingers in the softness of Armitage’s haunch, Armitage’s tapered fingers finding the groove of Ben’s spine, working their way down its length. As they moved together, Armitage grew damp from the moisture beading from Ben’s penis, and he felt his own spasm, felt the liquid on Ben’s hand as he stroked.

It was all too much. The pleasure worked its way through Armitage’s whole body, tightening each muscle until it seemed as if the tension would breaks him. Ben’s spine was growing slick with perspiration and his breath was in Armitage’s ear.

“Oh god,” he cried. “I can’t — much longer — oh fuck —”

And the last words were almost a murmur in Ben’s deep voice, and that was when Armitage’s will broke — in an explosion of pleasure, the pressure mounting until it burst from him, and he cried out, longer and louder than he ever did on his own. Ben’s moans came fast after his, their hip thrusts becoming spasmodic, their hands, hot and sticky.

Only later, after they panted together, foreheads touching; after they had cleaned up and sighed and lay in each other’s arms on Ben’s narrow bed did Armitage think about finality of what he had done. It was the end of the denial of who he was, of what he wanted. If he could do this, then perhaps he could stop hiding entirely. He could stop taking solitary bows to Arkanis through the window of his room.

Instead, he could start taking them from the stage.

Ben was breathing peacefully against his shoulder. Armitage lay on his back, seeing through the ceiling of Ben’s room to the stars.


	25. XXV - The Last Night at the Fair

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armitage, Ben, Phasma, and Cassandra try to have fun at the fair. But has the darkness followed them?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is from "Rusholme Ruffians" by The Smiths
> 
> “As a child I was literally educated at fairgrounds. It was a place of tremendous violence and hate and stress and high romance and all the true vital things in life. It was really the patch of ground where you learned about everything simultaneously whether you wanted to or not.” -Morrissey

### Chapter 25

#### The Last Night at the Fair

“I think he’s well and truly lost to us,” Cassandra said, jutting her chin at the scene playing out next to Phasma’s car in the summer twilight.

Armitage leaned against the passenger side, head tipped back to look at Ben as they spoke softly to each other, eyes locked together. Cassandra had to admit they made a pretty picture, with the mellow light glinting off Armitage’s hair and highlighting Ben’s distinctive profile. But she worried. Phasma had talked them all into going to the last night at the fair — a night infamous for roving bands of lads looking for trouble — and Armitage and Ben, obviously besotted and only just able to keep their hands off each other, were target for trouble.

Phasma grinned. All six feet and three inches of her lounged, unconcerned, against the back wall of the ticket booth, one foot crossed jauntily over the other. She wore red lipstick and black eyeliner like armor, and the white skin visible through the rip in one knee or the tight fit of her jeans didn’t make her vulnerable. She looked uncrossable. Cassandra envied her this. She thought of the two men on the house porch, their leers, the curl of their lips, the way they called her “love.” They’d never do that to Phasma, and not just because of her height. Cassandra had dressed carefully for the fair, in emulation of Phasma, if she were honest — tight jeans, a Blondie T-shirt with the sleeves rolled, hair teased around her face, eyes lined (her lipstick was not red, however — it just didn’t look right with her complexion). It didn’t make her feel safer, thought. It made her feel like people would look at her, and some of them would be people like those men.

Cassandra hated that the incident had cut into her self-assurance so much. On the sidewalk in front of the record shop or boutiques, in her school kilt and blazer, she had held sway — confident enough to introduce herself to the lovely, lonely American boy who was hanging about. Cassandra sighed. She wished she could get that girl back — before the men on the porch, before her father had her snatched off the street and locked her up in his house.

Maybe, Cassandra thought, since all of that had happened there was something in herself that marked her as damaged, easy prey. Armitage was the same, and she wished he wasn’t more than she wished the same for herself.

No, she thought, she wouldn’t change him, or herself — though she wished all the hurt they had suffered under their father’s cruelty had never happened. She wished the world were different.

“Do you think Ben will really go back to New York?” Cassandra asked, kicking at the turf

Phasma shrugged. “Arm says he’s determined. Ben thinks that Arkanis would be better off without him.”

“I’ve been wondering…” Cassandra kicked at the turf with her. “Would Armie be better off with Ben? In New York, I mean. Not that I want him to go away, but maybe he’d be happier.”

Phasma pulled a cigarette from the pack in the front pocket of her denim jacket and lit it. “I think he’d lose himself in New York,” she said. “If he wants to make music, to make art — he needs to do it here, at least at first.”

“Ben says —”

“I know what Ben says,” Phasma interrupted impatiently. “But he’s not _from_ here. He doesn’t know how this place, dreary though it is, fuels us.”

Cassandra crossed her arms tight on her chest. “Not me. I’ve decided — as soon as I can, I’m leaving. My teachers think I can pass my O-levels with high enough marks for Oxford or Cambridge, and Ms. Sloane is making sure it’ll get paid for.”

“That’s brilliant, Cass,” Phasma said. She studied the end of her cigarette for a moment. “And I understand. Why you need to leave.”

Cassandra nodded. “I guess it’s not the same for Armie, though. You’re right. He belongs to Arkanis. Or it’ll belong to him — someday.”

Phasma laughed and then called out to the two boys. “Oy, you two! We’re about to join the revelry without you!”

Ben and Armitage looked over as if just remembering that the rest of the world existed. They were beautiful, Cassandra thought, and her heart felt like it could burst with her wish that the everyone could recognize it. But her fear made her walk over to Ben and take his arm, placing herself between him and her brother, for the safety the act gave both her and Armitage.

Armitage frowned at Cassandra, just for a second and then, as if realizing why she’d done it, he went over to Phasma. “Seems my sister has staked her claim.”

“Oh, and I’m second choice, then?” Phasma said, winking.

Armitage kissed her cheek. “Never, darling. You were my first, remember?”

Cassandra didn’t want to know what _that_ meant. She turned to Ben as they walked together, in pairs, to the midway. “Does Arkanis feel any different now to you?” she asked.

“I’ve lived here for four years,” Ben said. “There’s always a little sunshine in June. Doesn’t change what’s underneath.”

“I don’t mean the weather, you pillock,” Cassandra said, bumping him with her shoulder as they walked. “I mean Armie.”

Ben looked over at Armitage, holding his eyes on him for a moment in a way too obvious for _anyone_ to miss. “He makes me worry about Arkanis more.”

Cassandra followed Ben’s gaze. “ _I_ worry about Armie, not Arkanis.”

“I worry about him, too, Cass.”

“Then why leave?”

They crossed under the archway with rust coming through its white paint onto the carnival grounds. Under its red and gold lights, Ben’s face glowed with an almost holy conviction, like the faces of saints. Cassandra hoped that the lights hid her blush as an image of Ben as St. Sebastian crossed her mind.

“You know as well as I do that Armitage has to be here to become what he’s destined to be,” Ben said.

“Destined? That makes everything seem very pre-determined.”

Ben turned to her, his red lips full in an almost-pout, his dark eyes serious. “He’s almost there. You’ll see on Thursday.”

Thursday was another all-ages night at New Republic, and Ben and Armitage were going to perform some songs. They’d been holed up in Armitage’s room for two weeks, the sound of acoustic guitar and quiet singing interspersed with frequent long silences followed by soft laughter. Cassandra had found it all very lonely and was spending more time than she ever had at school — even after hours in the library. Hence, the nuns’ new-found belief in her university potential.

Phasma and Armitage stopped and she turned toward them.

“Carousel?” Phasma asked, pointing. “Just the thing to bring us into the spirit of the place. You two seem _very_ serious right now. Outside horses only — we’re throwing rings!”

“All right,” Ben said, grinning. “What’s the prize for getting the most rings in?”

“I think the better question is ‘What’s the penalty for getting the fewest?” Phasma shot back.

“The Rotor,” Armitage said. “By yourself.”

“That’s not fair!” Cassandra said. “I can barely reach the ring dispenser and you’re all giants!”

“You’ll still get more than Arm, I’m sure,” Phasma said.

They bought their tickets and trotted to the carousel, weaving their way through the metal barricades and drawing curious glances from the kids whose parents hadn’t yet dragged them home.

“Look, there’s a black horse in front a ginger one,” Ben said. “I call those for Armitage and me.”

“Somebody’s keen to ride a ginger,” Phasma said, smirking.

“ _Phasma_ , oh my god,” Cassandra cried. “ _No_.”

Ben flushed red almost instantly. “I meant —”

“Don’t be Victorian, Ben.” Phasma rolled her eyes. “And I’m sorry for not covering your ears first, Miss Prim,” she added to Cassandra.

They climbed on four horses on the outside, all in a row. Phasma’s was gray with a white mane, Cassandra’s was white with pink roses on its reins, and Ben and Armitage had the black and ginger horses. It was all so familiar from her childhood — the ring of the bell as the carousel started up, slowly at first as the calliope music wound up, and then the air through her hair and the gentle rise and fall of the horse.

The General had brought them to the funfair once, and Cassandra had imagined the carousel horses cantering off the merry-go-round, like they did in _Mary Poppins_. She and Armitage would ride away — back home, or maybe somewhere else entirely. Just far away from Brendol. When she had looked back at Armitage that day, his eyes were cast up as he studied the mechanism that made the horses rise and fall, his face serious, green eyes intent. He got that look when he listened to music, still, and when he looked at Ben’s face. He was watching Ben now as Ben reached for the rings now. He laughed as Ben grabbed two at once in his big hand.

“Cheater!” Armitage cried, forgetting to grab a ring himself as he passed the dispenser.

Both of Ben’s rings sailed into the clown’s mouth. By some miracle, Cassandra managed to get a ring, but hers hit the canvas on the clown’s nose with a hollow _thump_.

In the end, Armitage _did_ lose because though neither of them got a ring in, he threw fewer than Cassandra. They hauled him to the Rotor but showed mercy when he went pale and pled his recent injury at the sight of the whirling steel barrel.

“How about the ferris wheel instead?” he said weakly.

Ben smirked. “Only if I get to swing the carriage as much as I want.”

Armitage swallowed. “All right,” he said. “But I’ll get my payback.”

Cassandra squashed herself into a carriage with Phasma, wondering how Ben and Armitage could fit with all their long limbs. But then, they probably didn’t mind close quarters. As soon as the wheel began to turn, their carriage started rocking wildly, and Ben’s deep laugh floated over the fairgrounds. Cassandra was sure she heard Armitage squeal.

But then after a couple of revolutions, the carriage stopped swinging and they quieted. From their silhouettes, Cassandra could see that their shoulders were touching, their heads so close together that their hair mingled as the wind blew it.

“I hope I’m never that gooey,” Cassandra said to Phasma.

“I won’t say ‘Wait until you meet the right person,’” Phasma said. “I hate hearing that kind of shite. But I suppose I’m happy they found each other.”

“Maybe that’s part of this grand scheme of Arkanis, too.”

“Is it a scheme? I thought it was a _darkness_.” Phasma snorted.

“Is that where your art comes from, do you think?”

Phasma shook her head. “Art doesn’t come from any one place. If there’s darkness in Arkanis, then, yeah, that’s part of it. But everything is filtered through _me_ — my point of view, my sense of aesthetics, my experiences, not some intangible _essence_. If the darkness is real, it is because we act and _make_ it real.”

“And if it’s real we can _change_ it,” Cassandra said. “Maybe I shouldn’t go away to university after all.”

“You should do whatever is right for _you_ , Cass.”

They were at the top of the wheel now, paused for a moment as others got out of their carriages at the bottom. Night had taken over, only a few stars visible in the sky. Raucous shouts were beginning below. Cassandra followed a group of young men who were yelling a football chant down the midway. They shoved at each other, mostly in a seemingly good-natured, laddish way, but that would change once they started drinking in earnest. Cassandra’s stomach lurched as the ferris wheel turned to let off the next carriage.

Phasma must have noticed her uneasiness because she said, “Nolite te bastardes carburondorum,” and bumped Cassandra with her shoulder. “Let’s have some fun, eh?”

After they got off the ferris wheel, Phasma won a huge pink stuffed rabbit from the strength test, which she promptly gave to a little girl. Ben won a goldfish with a white body and patch of orange on its head by tossing a ping-pong ball into its bowl.

He held up the plastic bag triumphantly. “What do you think? Should we name him ‘Armie’?”

“Why not ‘Cass’?” Armitage asked. “Her hair is ginger, too, but no one seems to remember that.”

“Fair brother, there is none as ginger as you,” Cassandra said, joining with Phasma in laughing.

“It seems like bad luck,” Armitage said. “Funfair goldfish tend to turn belly-up within three days.”

“Then he’ll spend his three days being a credit to his namesake, isn’t that right, Ben?” Phasma said.

Ben peered closely at the fish. “Oh, yeah. I’m gonna spoil Armie Jr. rotten.”

Cassandra tried not to swallow her laugh as she saw two men at the tail end of a pack of fair-rovers eye their little group. She gazed back defiantly. One of them gave her a smirk and sidled up to her.

“Those lot can make you laugh, but give me a chance, love, and I’ll make you scream,” he said, his voice low. He was counting on her being the only one to hear him and being too afraid to say anything.

The men on the porch. Her father’s man, who had pulled her into the car. Her father, as he told her that no daughter of his was going to be a degenerate slut. And now this fair hooligan. All of them wore that same expression, the certainty of having power over her in their eyes.

Well, they didn’t.

“ _Oy!_ ” Cassandra yelled as the man who had spoken to her started to return to his mates, laughing at her expense.

He turned around to look at her. “You taking me up on my offer, love?”

She was in front of him in two strides and had him by the collar of his Manchester United polo. She drew back her right fist as if to punch him — and he flinched. His eyes squeezed shut, a pull away from her.

So she let go. And laughed. Behind her, she heard Phasma, Ben, and Armitage running over and calling out her name. The man stumbled backward, and then his eyes were on her in fury, hard like dull metal. He spat at her feet.

“Fuckin’ cow!” He looked to his mates for support. “She’s crazy!”

But they laughed, casting assessing looks at Cassandra. One gave her harasser a shove on the shoulder that wasn’t entirely friendly. “She gave you something to piss your pants about, eh, mate?” he said. He jutted his chin out at Cassandra. “Little thing like that?”

He clapped his hand on the man’s shoulder harder then and steered him away from Cassandra. They walked on, scuffling with each other and then taking up their football chant again.

Cassandra lowered her hands, which were steady, though her breath had quickened and spots of heat had bloomed on her cheeks. _Little thing_. Still just a source of amusement. She hated them, all of them.  She allowed herself that, the anger that had made her ball her hand into a fist, to grit her teeth and answer the man’s arrogance with fury.

“You all right, Cass?”

Armitage’s hand on her shoulder — a touch so different from the firm hand on her arm, pushing her toward the car, holding her back from the door before she kicked him. She turned and smiled at him.

“No, not all right. But getting better.”

“Do you want to go home?”

Cassandra shook her head. “Why should I?” She took his hand and pulled him down the midway. “Even if you’re too much of a coward to ride the Rotor, _I_ still want to. I might steal your boyfriend for that, though. For moral support.”

She laughed as Armitage’s face pinkened at the word _boyfriend_.

“I’m still not used to that,” he muttered and then smiled.

But Ben was standing behind Armitage, his expression intent as he watched the group of lads walk away and then looked back at Cassandra. Their eyes met for a moment, and what Cassandra saw in them was not his usual fondness — it was fear. Not _of_ her — Cassandra couldn’t imagine Ben ever being afraid of her — but _for_ her. When he had intervened with the men on the porch or charged through her father’s house there had been no fear in his eyes. But now, having seen her anger, there it was.

Cassandra rolled her eyes. “Ben Solo, if a girl getting cross at a sex pest is going to spook you, maybe I should take Phasma on the Rotor with me instead.” She put her hands on her hips and spoke over the sounds of the rides and crowds around them. “I know what you’re thinking. But I’m not angry because of some stupid dark force that only you can sense. I’m angry because so many bloody… _men_ don’t treat me like a person. Don’t you do it, too.”

Ben shook his head and then bowed it. “Sorry, Cass. I’ll go with you.” He handed his goldfish to Phasma. “Take good care of him.”

Cassandra grabbed him by the hand and pulled him toward the line for the Rotor. His palm was cold and moist. Cassandra looked back at him, his full red lips, his eyebrows drawn together. She squeezed his hand.

“Someday I’ll save _you_ from the clutches of a villain, and then we’ll be even,” she said.

Ben swallowed. “I’ll hold you to that.”

**Author's Note:**

> Updating about once a week for now!
> 
> Ta very much for reading! I love comments, so please don't be shy.
> 
> Here's the [Tumblr post](https://the-call-from-the-light.tumblr.com/post/178000796691/arkanis-is-mine) for this fic to reblog, should you feel inspired to do so. :)
> 
> I often post excerpts of works-in-progress at my twitter account — [@ZippaSix](https://twitter.com/ZippaSix).
> 
> I made a playlist to go along with this fic — [And If You're Northern, That Makes It Even Worse](https://itunes.apple.com/us/playlist/and-if-youre-northern-that-makes-it-even-worse/pl.u-kNmC744Lqa)


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